FIRST  LOVE 


MARIE  VAN  VORST 


FIRST   LOVE 


e« 


Milly 


FIRST  LOVE 


MARIE  VAN  VORST 

Author  of 

IN  AMBUSH,  MISS  DESMOND 
THE  GIRL  FROM  HIS  TOWN 


WITH    ILLUSTRATIONS    BY 

F.  GRAHAM  COOTES 


INDIANAPOLIS 

THE  BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


COPYRIGHT  1910 
THK  BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 


PRESS  Of 

BRAUNWORTH  &  CO. 

BOOKBINDERS  AND  PRINTERS 

BROOKLYN,  N.  Y. 


TO  THE  DAUGHTER  OF 
THE  AUTHOR  OF  DAVID  HARUM- 

VIOLET  WESTCOTT 
THIS  BOOK  IS  DEDICATED 


2138493   ' 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I  THE  BOY I 

II  THE  DECISION 18 

III  A  WINDFALL 23 

IV  THE  LADY 34 

V  THE  HORSE  SHOW 44 

VI  THE  RACE 53 

VII  THE  REASON 62 

VIII  THE  BRUTE 76 

IX  A  DINNER go 

X  AN  INTERVIEW 113 

XI  THE  MORNING  WALK        ....  132 

XII  THE  PROPOSAL 146 

XIII  A  CONFESSION 161 

XIV  MEDITATIONS 180 

XV  THE  WOMAN-HATER  193 

XVI  THE  PRESENTIMENT 203 

XVII  THE  PRODIGAL 211 

XVIII    THE  RECKONING 224 

XIX  THE  SUSPICION 234 

XX  WITHOUT  MERCY 248 

XXI  A  NURSERY  RHYME 273 

XXII  A  SCENE 279 

XXIII  THE  DOCTOR  AND  His  BOY       ...  291 

XXIV  A  RARE  THING 312 

XXV  THE  SPELL  BROKEN 318 


FIRST  LOVE 

CHAPTER    I 

THE  BOY 

HE  had  probably  never  vibrated  to  any 
great  extent  heretofore;  nor  could  have 
recorded  a  stronger  emotion  than  that  which 
thrilled  him  when  he  pulled  a  frog  out  of  a 
pool,  or  succeeded  in  climbing  "the  highest  tree 
round."  Certain  it  is  that  on  the  fifteenth  of 
May,  1 8 — ,  his  heart  throbbed  right  enough, 
and  he  felt  so  deeply  that  the  memory  of  his 
emotion  left  a  vivid  mark  down  through  his 
whole  life — down  through  his  whole  life. 

These  feelings  returned  many  times  when 

boy-hands  were  too  small  to  hold  such  vastness ; 

but  they  were  cruel,  too,  and  came  back  later, 

when  he  had  learned  what  that  memory  was. 

i 


FIRST   LOVE 

And  when  the  last  sunsets  flushed  his  sky,  the 
image  of  her  shone  over  him  like  a  star. 

One  May  afternoon  John  Bennett  stood  in 
the  parlor  of  the  James  Street  house — in  his 
own  parlor  in  his  own  house.  He  had  been 
motherless  since  his  birth,  and  his  father  had 
died  last  year;  but  this  house  was  his  home, 
and  every  carpet  and  every  crack,  and  every 
spot  and  stain  and  mark  John  knew  well.  The 
very  odors  were  familiar  and  belonged  to  "his 
house."  This  Easter  vacation,  though  there 
wasn't  any  family  for  him  to  come  home  to,  he 
had  been  brought  back  from  school  by  a  tele- 
gram, for  the  house  was  to  be  sold  at  auction, 
and  the  natives  of  Syracuse  would  be  at  hand  to 
pick  up  the  remnants  of  furniture,  bric-a-brac 
and  belongings,  and  when  all  the  debts  should 
be  paid,  if  any  money  was  left  over  it  would 
be  put  aside  for  John.  He  supposed  "the  peo- 
ple" would  tell  him  what  he  was  to  do.  One  of 
the  "people"  was  Doctor  Brainard,  the  family 

2 


THE    BOY 

physician ;  another  was  a  real  estate  agent ;  and 
John  Bennett  wasn't  clear  who  the  rest  of  them 
were,  and  it  didn't  make  any  great  difference, 
anyway. 

The  sale  had  been  going  on  all  day,  and 
John  hid  between  the  parlor  curtains,  looking 
out  at  the  little  front  yard  where  just  below  in 
the  soft,  muddy  street  the  one-horse  car  cut 
its  way  and  jingled  slushingly  along.  John 
knew  the  car  well,  he  had  driven  it ;  "the  man 
had  let  him,"  and  it  was  the  most  delightful 
fun  in  the  world,  better  than  ringing  door-bells 
and  running  away,  better  than  any  kind  of 
make-believe  game,  for  he  was  then  the  real 
driver  of  a  real  animal,  and  he  felt  a  great 
responsibility  when  he  turned  the  little  loose 
brake  of  the  tram  and  drove  the  lean  steady 
horse  while  the  driver  used  to  stand  and  chat 
and  laugh  and  read  the  Syracuse  Times. 

Up  the  stone  walk  from  the  street  to  the 
house  he  had  dashed  thousands  of  times;  on 
his  bicycle  out  through  the  gate,  down  the 
3 


FIRST   LOVE 

broad  walk  to  the  town  at  the  foot  of  the  hill. 
Countless  times  he  had  turned  into  the  candy 
shop  or  the  soda-water  fountain,  where  he 
had  "treated"  as  long  as  he  had  a  cent  to 
spend. 

Now  the  grass  was  grown  high,  and  the 
dandelions  scattered  golden  heads  softly 
through  the  green.  The  air  smelled  of  blossoms 
and  of  May,  the  day  looked  bright  and  clean. 
Rows  of  buggies,  carriages,  and  wagons  filled 
James  Street  in  front  of  the  Bennett  house, 
and  a  red  auction  flag  floated  out  at  the  gate. 

Doctor  Brainard  had  told  John  that  there 
were  a  few  valuable  books,  a  few  ornaments, 
and  his  mother's  piano  which  he  might  be  glad 
to  possess;  but  there  was  no  money  to  buy 
these  things  for  the  Bennett  boy,  and  except 
for  a  desolate  sense  that  under  his  feet  the 
very  world  was  being  cut  away  by  a  blow  of 
the  auctioneer's  hammer,  John  didn't  mind. 
He  didn't  take  possessions  to  heart,  but  there 
was  just  one  thing  he  wanted.  The  little  boy, 
4 


THE   BOY 

not  sentimental  about  the  furniture,  had 
yearned  for  this  one  thing  for  years.  Now, 
on  the  auctioneer's  table,  long  and  slender, 
recalling  his  father  as  did  nothing  else,  lay 
the  prize  shot-gun  awarded  Mr.  Bennett  at 
the  Hill  Club  for  clay  pigeon  shooting,  and 
John  thought  that  if  he  saw  that  gun  carried 
out  of  the  house  under  his  eyes  he  would  die ! 

In  his  knickerbockers  and  his  little  plain 
clothes,  hands  in  his  pockets,  his  brow  puckered 
and  his  feet  planted  firmly  on  the  floor,  the 
child  stood  before  the  holocaust  of  his  goods 
and  chattels  and  waited  for  the  auctioneer's 
voice  to  call  out  this  article  as  the  others  had 
been  called,  and  the  moment  was  the  biggest 
tragedy  of  John's  life. 

Mr.  Bennett,  improvident,  charming,  tal- 
ented and  clever,  had  lived  like  a  prince  on  his 
credit  in  the  house  in  James  Street.  There 
were  fine  brands  of  champagne  in  the  cellar; 
there  were  good  cigars,  already  called  off  and 
appreciated;  there  were  pistols  and  fencing- 
5 


FIRST    LOVE 

foils,  masks  and  shields — nothing  but  the 
gentleman's  personal  clothes  were  wanting  to 
give  a  note  to  the  sale.  His  silver  toilet  articles, 
his  canes  with  fantastic  handles,  his  little  col- 
lection of  old  snuff-boxes — all  had  been  sold. 

Near  the  little  chap  in  the  window  Doctor 
Brainard — his  own  feelings  much  alive — had 
taken  his  place  to  watch  the  sale. 

Doctor  Brainard  had  been  in  love  with  Mrs. 
Bennett,  and  his  sentiment  was  deep  for  the 
piano.  John  had  not  paid  attention  to  the 
old  man's  absorbed  face,  and  didn't  dare  ask 
him  to  buy  the  gun;  he  dared  ask  nothing. 
He  had  been  told  that  the  debts  "were  dis- 
graceful, they  heaped  up  high  as  the  house," 
and  he  felt  humiliated  and  burdened. 

From  where  he  had  hidden  the  gun  was 
not  visible,  but  he  knew  he  would  hear  when 
they  should  call  it  out,  and  he  listened,  his 
whole  heart  in  his  ears.  He  had  told  the  fel- 
lows at  school  about  that  gun,  and  they  had 
envied  him,  and  he  had  dreamed  of  carrying 
6 


THE    BOY 

it,  for  he  was  a  sportsman  born  and  by  inherit- 
ance. He  endured  whacks  and  bruises  and 
hurts  as  all  manly  boys  do,  but  he  could  not 
bear  this  sacrifice.  His  father's  own  prize  gun ! 
"Gosh,  dang!"  he  said,  and  was  sincerely  pro- 
fane. 

He  drew  his  sleeve  across  his  eyes,  and  as 
he  did  so  he  saw  through  his  tears  that  a  new 
vehicle  had  slushed  through  the  muddy  road 
and  stopped  before  the  gate.  From  the  big 
dog-cart,  driven  by  an  English  groom,  a  lady 
descended  and  came  quickly  up  the  path.  John 
knew  the  rig  to  belong  to  the  Bathursts,  and 
the  lady  to  be  none  other  than  Mrs.  Peter 
Bathurst.  She  wasn't  important  to  him,  and 
if  with  the  crowd  she  had  passed  in  earlier  he 
would  not  have  noticed  her;  but  now  as  she 
sailed  up  the  walk  in  her  spring  dress,  a  touch 
of  ruffled  white  at  the  front  of  her  bodice  and 
the  flash  of  flowers  in  her  hat,  she  was  most 
lovely  and  the  boy  looked  at  her  long.  There 
was  a  brightness,  a  gayness  about  her,  she  dif- 
7 


FIRST   LOVE 

fered  from  the  dried  specimens  of  townsfolk 
filling  the  room. 

There  was  also  about  her  a  freedom  from 
the  horrors  of  money.  She  didn't  seem  to 
belong  to  auctions,  and  she  came  in  like  the 
beams  of  sunlight. 

The  lady  passed  over  to  her  friend,  Doctor 
Brainard,  and  the  doctor  rose  and  gave  her 
his  place.  John  heard  her  rustle  to  her  seat, 
and  something  that  smelled  like  violets  floated 
to  where  he  stood. 

"Doctor,  your  wire  came  to  me  up  in  the 
Valley  yesterday,  and  I  am  glad  you  sent  it. 
I  wouldn't  have  missed  this  sale,  you  know,  for 
anything." 

The  gentle  voice  was  the  first  agreeable 
sound  that  had  fallen  on  John's  ears  that  day ; 
it  was  a  pleasant  contrast  to  the  auctioneer's 
tones,  and  "Where's  the  boy?"  he  heard  her 
say  again. 

"I  don't  know,  I'm  sure;  he's  around  here 
somewhere." 

8 


THE    BOY 

Mrs.  Bathurst  opened  her  catalogue.  "I'm 
sorry  those  decanters  are  gone,  and  the  coffee 
service ;  I  adored  the  china." 

"I  have  put  aside  the  books  for  you,"  the 
doctor  replied,  "and — and  the  piano  still  re- 
mains. I  shall  buy  it  myself." 

"I  shan't  overbid  you,"  Mrs.  Bathurst  said 
sympathetically.  "You  may  count  on  me." 

John  faced  about  and  looked  into  the  room, 
which,  transfigured  by  disorder  and  filled  with 
strangers,  was  dreadful  to  him.  The  home 
aspect  had  for  ever  disappeared,  it  was  as 
impersonal  and  indifferent  as  a  waiting-room 
in  a  station,  a  place  from  which  now  he  would 
be  glad  to  take  some  train  that  would  carry 
him  far  away. 

John  heard  the  books  called  off.  They  were 
old  friends.  His  father  had  taken  delight  and 
pride  in  showing  them  to  his  son,  but  John 
could  let  books  go  without  a  pang;  he  was  an 
outdoor  boy,  a  sport.  Then  came  his  mother's 
piano,  so  full  of  sentiment  to  others ;  but  it  had 
9 


FIRST   LOVE 

none  for  him,  he  had  never  seen  her.  The 
doctor  bought  it,  and  the  little  boy  had  no  place 
in  the  feelings  the  purchase  aroused. 

Now  it  came,  however — the  gun! 

The  auctioneer  drew  it  out  of  the  case :  there 
was  a  silver  harp  on  the  shining  wood,  en- 
graved with  his  father's  name,  the  name  of  the 
club,  and  the  date  of  the  pigeon  contest.  The 
little  boy  stepped  from  his  place  of  hiding, 
his  nervous  hands  deep  in  his  pockets,  his  face 
scarlet  above  his  black  tie  and  his  turnover  col- 
lar. His  shock  of  disordered  hair  was  thick 
above  his  eyes  and  brow.  "If  I  had  a  million 
dollars,"  he  thought,  "I'd  give  them  for  father's 
gun.  They  don't  know,"  he  said  behind  his 
set  teeth,  "they  don't  knoiv!" 

He  looked  hopefully  around  the  room  at  the 
possible  purchasers.  By  the  door  stood  the 
minister  who  had  baptized  him.  John  passed 
him  over  caustically — a  parson  with  a  gun! 
No,  he  wouldn't  buy  it. 

There  were  both  friends  and  enemies  in  the 
10 


THE    BOY 

crowd.  John  owed  seventy-five  cents  to  Hick- 
son,  the  candy  store  man.  The  other  faces 
grew  vague  and  blurred.  The  auctioneer  was 
telling  about  the  gun,  its  make  and  history. 
The  doctor  pushed  his  chair  back;  the  pur- 
chase of  the  piano  had  been  successful  and  he 
had  no  further  interest  in  the  sale.  And  here 
Mrs.  Bathurst  rose,  and  as  she  did  so  she  saw 
John's  face  peering  out  between  the  curtains, 
his  eyes  fixed  on  the  gun.  He  was  twelve 
years  old  then,  strong  and  muscular,  straight 
and  tall  for  his  age ;  he  had  a  manliness  about 
him,  a  fire! 

The  bidding  began.  As  the  bids  fell  fast 
and  eager,  John  looked  from  face  to  face,  over 
at  the  doctor  and  then  at  Mrs.  Bathurst.  He 
heard  her  speak,  he  heard  her  speak  again  and 
again,  and  then  the  auctioneer  said,  in  meas- 
ured tones  that  seemed  to  put  an  end  to  all  his 
longings,  "Sold  to  Mrs.  Peter  Bathurst,"  and 
the  boy's  heart  nearly  stopped. 

Bought  by  a  woman !  By  a  woman !  .  .  . 
ii 


FIRST    LOVE 

Like  a  thief  he  slipped  from  the  room  and 
crept  up-stairs  through  the  deserted  house. 

He  crushed  back  his  tears  and  his  sudden 
despair.  A  little  bedroom  had  been  set  apart 
for  his  occupancy,  all  his  things  had  been  put 
in  there;  but  as  John  rushed  into  this  refuge 
and  slammed  the  door  behind  him,  he  saw  that 
other  things,  too,  had  been  hastily  thrown  in 
pell-mell — his  father's  clothes.  Topmost  on 
John's  bed  were  the  corduroy  shooting-coat  and 
breeches.  He  flung  himself  down  and  buried 
his  face  in  the  garments,  which  still  seemed  to 
smell  of  the  woods.  A  dread  of  being  heard 
kept  him  silent  in  his  crying;  he  was  no  baby, 
anyhow,  but  he  couldn't  help  this  outburst. 
"Gosh !"  he  repeated,  "it's  too  mean,  too  mean. 
A  woman  with  that  bully  gun !" 

He  heard  voices  and  then  steps  on  the  stairs. 
In  another  moment  some  one  had  dared  to 
open  his  door  on  him  with  the  indiscretion 
which  grown-ups  display  toward  childhood. 

"Here  he  is!"  proclaimed  the  "darn  doctor 

12 


THE    BOY 

fool,"  as  the  boy  termed  him.  Then  the  doctor 
stood  aside  and  Mrs.  Bathurst  took  his  place. 

"John!  .  .  .  John,  may  I  come  in  a 
minute?" 

He  grumbled  he  "guessed  so,"  and  she  came 
in  and  sat  down  on  the  bed  near  the  corduroy 
clothes.  He  thought  her  quite  an  old  woman 
— she  was  then  about  twenty-five. 

"I  have  been  talking  to  the  doctor  about 
things,"  she  smiled,  her  eyes  all  crinkled  up 
into  little  curves  that  seemed  to  run  over  her 
face.  She  wore  a  spick-and-span  dress,  and 
one  hand,  lay  on  the  bed,  very  white  against 
the  brown  of  the  corduroy  hunting  clothes. 

"I  have  two  boys,  you  know,  at  my  house 
— my  stepsons,  little  Peter  and  Jack.  We  are 
at  the  Valley,  and  there  is  lots  of  riding  and 
sport  there.  I'd  love  to  have  you  come  home 
with  me  for  the  rest  of  the  holidays.  Will 
you?  I  am  going  back  at  once,  and  the  boys 
will  be  so  glad  to  see  you." 

The  "people"  hadn't  told  him  where  he  was 
13 


FIRST   LOVE 

to  stop,  even  for  the  night,  and  he  cast  a  des- 
perate glance  at  the  uninviting  bed  and  desolate 
little  room,  where  his  own  valise  lay  agape  on 
a  chair. 

But,  absorbed  as  he  was  in  his  own  affairs, 
the  grace  of  Mrs.  Bathurst's  welcome  touched 
the  boy.  She  was  so  much  prettier  near  to, 
she  was  so  softly  bright,  and  her  eyes  were 
leaf-brown.  She  was  nodding  and  smiling, 
and  she  didn't  "grab"  him  and  stroke  his  hair, 
she  only  sat  with  one  white  hand  on  the  hunt- 
ing coat  and  one  holding  her  handkerchief  in 
her  lap,  looking  up  at  him  with  those  lovely 
eyes.  In  the  language  of  his  rough  slang  he 
said  to  himself,  "She's  a  corker!  She's  a 
corker !" 

Then  his  resentment  arose.  He'd  forgot- 
ten- 
Continuing1  to  smile  ravishingly,  even  flirt- 
ing unconsciously  with  this  very  young  man, 
drawing  him  with  her  tenderness  and  with  that 
womanliness  that  speaks  to  the  most  youthful 


THE   BOY 

masculine  heart,  Mrs.  Bathurst  was  making 
him  her  victim. 

"I  was  so  glad  I  came  in  time  to-day,  John. 
I  bought  your  father's  gun  for  you.  I  bought 
the  set  of  china,  too,  and  the  silver.  I  want 
you  to  know  it  now  so  you  will  feel  you  have 
some  possessions.  I  bought  the  prize  gun.  I 
have  so  often  seen  your  father  pass  my  house 
with  it  on  his  shoulder.  It's  yours  now." 

The  color  left  his  face  where  the  tears  had 
made  stains  over  the  freckles  and  tan.  He 
wanted  to  say,  "I'll  buy  it  back  when  I'm  rich," 
but  it  didn't  seem  exactly  polite,  and  he  had  no 
thanks  at  command.  Indeed,  he  could  not  find 
anything  to  say,  a  crop  of  frogs  seemed  to 
jump  in  his  throat.  Rather  than  cry  before  a 
woman  he  would  have  been  flayed  alive;  he 
stared  at  her  desperately,  rather  angrily;  his 
blue  eyes  on  her  brown  ones.  But  he  could 
tell  through  the  blur  that  she  was  still  smiling. 

Virginia  Bathurst  was  clever  as  well  as  mer- 
ciful. "So  if  you'll  just  pack  up  those  things, 
15 


FIRST    LOVE 

John,  in  your  bag,  we  will  carry  them  down 
to  the  dog-cart." 

He  had  not  escaped  or  refused  her  invita- 
tion, but  he  had  fallen  madly  in  love. 

After  the  twelve-mile  drive  and  a  regular 
"party  dinner,"  beginning  with  clams  and  end- 
ing with  ice-cream;  after  a  rough-and-tumble 
fight  with  the  Bathurst  boys  in  the  hall  of  the 
big  old-fashioned  house,  John  went  at  bedtime 
to  his  own  room,  and  there  in  the  corner,  in 
its  canvas  bag,  stood  his  father's  gun.  The 
shock  of  the  sight  of  it,  suddenly  become  his 
very  own,  taught  him  how  to  express  gratitude. 
He  went  directly  out  into  the  hall,  intending 
to  go  down-stairs  and  thank  Mrs.  Bathurst. 
He  got  no  farther  than  the  head  of  the  stair- 
case. He  had  not  seen  his  friend  since  early 
that  afternoon,  for  the  boys  had  eaten  their 
supper  alone. 

She  had  come  up  the  flight  of  stairs,  and 
now  stood  on  the  top  step  in  a  white  dress,  her 
16 


THE    BOY 

neck  and  arms  bare  to  his  young  eyes.  Her 
husband  was  following,  smoking  his  cigar. 

"Why,  John!"  she  exclaimed  in  surprise, 
"not  in  bed  yet?" 

He  put  one  small  rough  hand  out  desperately. 
"I  was  just  going,"  he  stammered,  "when — 
when — " 

A  boy  would  rather  say  anything  else  in  the 
world  than  "thank  you."  In  his  rough,  simple 
code,  politeness  is  a  sign  of  weakness  and  girl- 
ishness. 

"I  wanted  to  say,"  he  stammered  hoarsely, 
"about  that  gun.  Well,  it's  all  right  .  .  ." 
he  ended  determinedly,  and  Mrs.  Bathurst 
nodded  back  at  him ;  she  understood.  She  was 
as  kind  as  she  was  beautiful. 

"Why,  of  course  it's  all  right !"  she  accepted 
cordially.  "Good  night,  John." 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  DECISION 

THE  "people"  managed  to  get  sufficient 
out  of  the  sale  to  pay  up  the  biggest  of  the 
bugbear  debts  and  when  school  opened  after 
the  holidays  John's  return  to  Exeter  was  taken 
for  granted.  The  day  before  he  went  back, 
Doctor  Brainard,  of  the  piano  romance,  was 
surprised  by  a  sudden  and  unannounced  visit 
from  the  boy. 

"See  here!"  John  Bennett  blurted  out. 
"Who's  sending  me  to  school,  anyway?" 

"Why,  John — "  the  doctor  began. 

"Is  she?" 

Doctor  Brainard  had  another  "she"  in  his 
mind,  and  was  puzzled. 

"Whom  do  you  mean?" 

"There's  a  ticket  up  in  the  cigar  store 
18 


THE    DECISION 

window.  It  says,  'Boy  wanted.'  I'd  rather 
go  and  apply." 

The  doctor  pointed  to  a  chair  vacated  by  the 
last  patient. 

"Sit  down." 

But  John  preferred  standing,  his  blue  and 
yellow  jockey  cap,  striped  by  the  school  colors, 
crushed  up  in  his  hand. 

"A  man  can't  get  very  far  these  days  with- 
out an  education,"  said  the  doctor.  "It's  too 
soon  to  take  you  out  of  school.  We  talked  it 
over,  and  it  seemed  wisest  for  you  to  go  back 
to  Exeter.  As  for  working  in  a  cigar 
store  .  .  ." 

Mr.  Bennett  had  been  the  "elegant"  of 
Syracuse,  the  most  learned,  delightful  man 
in  town — spendthrift,  prodigal,  kind  and  im- 
provident— he  had  spent  as  he  liked,  played, 
hunted,  and  ridden,  and  when  the  hard  corners 
had  at  last  threatened;  to  harm  him  too  cruelly, 
he  had  gone  out  of  the  world  with  no  unkind 
feelings  to  any  one  in  it. 

19 


FIRST   LOVE 

"My  boy,"  went  on  the  doctor,  "if  your 
father  were  living  he  would  send  you  to  school 
at  no  matter  what  sacrifice.  He  was  a  Harvard 
man,  and  I  know  that  he  would  want  you  to  go 
to  Cambridge." 

John  frowned,  a  way  he  had  when  he  was 
touched.  He  asked  with  effort : 

"I  didn't  think  there'd  be  enough  money?" 

Doctor  Brainard  hesitated  just  here  to  tell 
the  lie  that,  if  he  told  it  quickly  enough,  would 
have  reconciled  the  boy.  John  saw  that  he 
was  being  sent  by  some  one.  He  opened  his 
polo  cap  and  smoothed  it  out. 

"All  right,"  he  said  obstinately,  "I'm  going 
to  ask  Hickson  to  let  me  be  an  errand  boy." 

The  doctor  thought  he  saw  an  indolence  in 
this  attitude,  and  that  John  would  rather  play 
than  work  at  his  books. 

"Nonsense!  Rubbish!  You'll  disgrace  your 
mother's  name — disgrace  your  family!"  he 
added. 

"Well,  I'm  not  going  to  let  her  send  me  to 
20 


THE   DECISION 

school!"  John  said  sullenly,  and  the  doctor 
knew  then  whom  he  meant. 

"Do  you  mean  Mrs.  Bathurst?  Whatever 
put  that  into  your  head  ?" 

John's  call  was  between  patients'  visits,  and 
a  nervous  cough  from  the  ante-chamber  pene- 
trated the  doors. 

"Come,  come,"  said  the  doctor  impatiently, 
"Mrs.  Bathurst  knows  nothing  of  it  whatever. 
She's  never  thought  of  sending  you  to  school, 
and  there's  no  reason  why  she  should." 

"Who  is?"  John  asked  more  temperately, 
and  with  sudden  shame  and  relief. 

"Why,  I  happen  to  be  doing  so,"  said  his 
friend  shortly,  "and  you  can  thank  me  by 
studying  well  and  getting  along  in  your  class. 
That's  all  right,  John."  He  was  pushing  the 
small  figure  toward  the  door  and  ringing  his 
bell  at  the  same  time. 

"I'd  a  great  deal  rather  work'  here  in  a 
store,"  the  boy  urged  hopelessly. 

"Come,  come,"  said  his  friend  in  dismissal, 

21 


FIRST   LOVE 

"you  can't  work  in  village  stores,  you  know, 
and  you're  to  go  back  to-night,  aren't  you? 
.Well,  we'll  talk  things  over  at  dinner,"  and 
John  was  pushed  out  as  the  next  invalid  crept 
in  with  his  coughs,  and  fits,  and  abnormalities, 
and  valetudinarianisms,  while  the  healthy  little 
boy,  with  nothing  more  than  the  shame  of 
poverty  and  a  single  burden  of  debt  for  which 
he  felt  responsible,  heard  the  consulting-room 
door  shut  on  him. 

John  went  to  Exeter  that  night  from  the 
doctor's  house,  and  didn't  suggest  store-keep- 
ing again,  but  began  from  then  on  to  take  life 
and  education  and  what  pleasures  he  could  pick 
up  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  his  vacations 
were  full  of  visits  to  the  doctor's  house,  where 
the  smells  of  acids  and  medicines,  as  the  door 
opened  to  let  him  in  on  his  brief  holidays,  be- 
came connected  with  his  returns  to  all  he  knew 
now  of  home. 


22 


CHAPTER  III 

A  WINDFALL 

HIS  school-days  went  by,  bland,  irrespon- 
sible, with  the  bluff  rigors  of  winter  and 
its  rude  sports,  with  the  warm  effulgence  of 
summer  and  its  outdoor  things.  In  his  vaca- 
tions he  visited  his  schoolmates,  or  more 
usually  he  went  up  to  Doctor  Brainard's  farm, 
and  lived  like  a  country-man  in  the  hayfields, 
in  the  barns  and  lofts.  He  didn't  injure  him- 
self studying,  but  learned  without  trouble, 
stood  well  in  his  class,  and  was  the  best  boxer 
of  his  set  and  a  prime  shot. 

The  years  turned  him  out  a  big,  clear-eyed 
fellow,  with  a  thick  crop  of  hair,  which  his 
enemies  called  red,  and  a  fine  face,  full  of  life 
and  light. 

Before  he  passed  his  preliminaries  for  col- 
lege a  windfall  blew  something  his  way.  Fate 
23 


FIRST   LOVE 

shook  a  tree  that  grows  in  her  garden,  and 
John  Bennett,  standing  under  the  tree,  came  in 
for  the  fall.  A  pile  of  securities,  shares  in  an 
Oklahoma  mine,  were  gathered  up  out  of  the 
safe-deposit  box  by  Doctor  Brainard  and  sold 
one  day.  John  Bennett  learned  a  little  later 
that  he  needn't  go  through  college,  thanks  to 
anybody  but  his  own  father,  for  he  had  for 
life  a  little  competence,  a  little  income  that 
could  keep  him  like  a  gentleman. 

He  had  been  playing  foot-ball  one  November 
afternoon,  and  was  coming  across  the  fields 
toward  the  buildings,  his  arms  across  the  shoul- 
ders of  his  two  chums.  All  three  fellows  were 
singing  aloud.  He  had  been  sent  for  to  see 
Doctor  Brainard,  who  had  run  out  from  Bos- 
ton to  take  a  look  at  his  ward.  John  scorned 
convenances,  and  had  gone  into  the  parlor  as 
he  was,  his  baggy  trousers  green-stained  at  the 
knees,  his  hair  as  ragged  and  disturbed  as  a 
wheatfield  in  a  breeze,  his  cheeks  bright  with 
cold  and  exercise.  There  was  nothing  about 
24 


A   WINDFALL 

him  to  suggest  that  he  had  been  having  the 
blues ;  as  sincerely  as  a  healthy  boy  can  worry, 
he  had  worried.  He  was  in  debt — he  owed  a 
jolly  sum  for  a  boy — and  it  bothered  him 
beyond  words.  He  owed  at  the  florist's  a  little 
bill  of  thirty  dollars,  and -at  the  tailor's  some- 
thing like  a  hundred,  and  in  his  life  he  had 
never  clinked  together  at  one  time  the  cash 
of  more  than  a  ten-dollar  bill.  The  year  before 
he  had  fallen  in  love  with  a  girl  in  Boston. 
A  pair  of  blue  eyes,  a  tilt  of  the  head,  a  mixture 
of  prettiness  and  impertinence  bowled  John 
over,  and  he  had  wooed  his  sweetheart  well. 
His  very  limited  wardrobe,  bought  for  the  most 
part  by  Doctor  Brainard  at  department  stores, 
"made  him  sick,"  and  he  had  ordered  decent 
clothes  from  the  best  tailor  in  Boston;  and, 
stimulated  by  the  color  of  the  girl's  blue  eyes, 
he  had  sent  her  violets  and  other  flowers,  only 
stopping  when  he  realized  that  she  did  not 
really  care  a  pin  about  him. 

The  Christmas  holidays  were  near  at  hand, 
25 


FIRST    LOVE 

and  he  had  laid  his  plans  for  putting  the  case 
to  Doctor  Brainard  when  he  should  go  home. 
There  was  nothing  of  the  coward  about  the 
big,  mature  boy,  who,  young  as  he  was,  looked 
the  man,  and  who,  young  as  he  was,  had  the 
temperament  and  ardor  that  might  turn  him 
so  strongly  for  good  or  ill. 

But  there  was  in  him  nothing  of  the  weak- 
ness that  had  made  his  father  a  prodigal, 
irresponsible  spendthrift,  and  John  had  planned 
a  noble  solution  of  his  problems  to  present 
to  Doctor  Brainard. 

"I'll  go  to  Cambridge,  just  the  same,"  he 
had  intended  saying  to  his  guardian,  "only  I'll 
work  there  in  some  way  or  other — tutor,  or 
something,  I  don't  know  what  they  do — until 
I've  paid  up  what  I  owe  in  Boston;  that  is,  I 
mean  to  say,  if  you'll  advance  me  the  little 
money  I  shall  need  to  enter  Harvard;  or,  if 
you'd  rather,  I'll  work  right  here  in  Syracuse, 
I'll  do  that." 

He  had  thought  it  out  in  a  dozen  ways,  but 
26 


A   WINDFALL 

this  seemed  the  best.  Never  havjng  owed  a 
cent  in  his  life  or  realized  any  kind  of  respon- 
sibility, these  first  debts  had  to  him  a  horror 
and  a  shame.  No  unexpected  stranger  arrived 
at  the  school  during  the  last  month,  but  John 
thought  he  might  be  a  collector  from  the 
tailor's,  or  something  more  appalling  than  a 
gardener  from  the  florist's,  and  it  kept  him  in  a 
flutter. 

But  he  was  sure  there  was  some  way  out  of 
it,  and  when  he  learned  that  Doctor  Brainard 
was  really  within  the  school  walls  there  was  a 
sense  of  relief  that  he  should  have  it  all  out 
with  him  now,  before  the  holidays.  Doctor 
Brainard  was  the  only  person  who  stood  to  him 
in  the  way  of  guide  or  friend.  There  was 
no  father  to  bullyrag  about  his  indiscretions, 
no  mother  to  weep  about  them;  and  these 
weren't,  after  all,  gambling  debts,  they  were 
nothing  but  debts  of  folly  because  he  had  made 
a  fool  of  himself  about  a  girl. 

Violets  and  good  clothes  had  not  won  Milly 
27 


FIRST    LOVE 

Haven,  and  John  had  come  out  of  the  expe- 
rience damaged  a  little,  for  the  young  creature 
had  flirted  dreadfully  with  him,  she  had  given 
him  the  mitten  before  the  whole  school.  A 
college  man  had  come  along,  a  fellow  old 
enough  to  be  her  .  .  .  brother,  and  John 
Bennett  wasn't  in  it  any  more.  But  his  debts 
were  with  him.  He  owed  a  hundred  and 
thirty  dollars,  and  his  allowance  at  this  time 
was  about  forty  cents  a  week ! 

He  had  pondered  over  these  things  on  his 
unhappy  pillow  many  times  before  healthy  sleep 
carried  him  off  to  the  peaceful  fields  beyond  all 
care. 

Bennett  went  in  as  he  was  to  the  library, 
where  Doctor  Brainard  stood  ruminating 
before  a  plaster  cast  of  a  boy's  head  and  shoul- 
ders on  a  pedestal  by  the  window.  The  doctor 
had  been  studying  with  interest  this  work  of 
art.  It  was  idealized,  but  there  was  a  curve 
of  the  cheek,  a  turn  of  the  temple,  a  touch  of 
the  line  of  the  ear  that  recalled  to  him  the  days 
28 


A   WINDFALL 

whose  memories  had  made  him  purchase  Mrs. 
Bennett's  piano  at  the  spring  sale. 

"Why,  isn't  this  a  bust  of  you,  John?"  he 
asked,  as  the  big  foot-ball  half-back  came  into 
the  room. 

"Yes,"  returned  the  young  man  shortly; 
"rot,  isn't  it,  to  have  it  here?  I'll  smash  it  up 
some  day,  when  I  get  the  chance." 

"It's  an  excellent  likeness,  an  excellent  like- 
ness!" 

He  shook  his  ward  by  the  hand  with  unusual 
warmth. 

"It  looks  like  your  mother." 

John  did  not  say  that  the  art  professor  had 
asked  leave  to  cast  this  head  as  the  most  perfect 
head  of  youth  that  he  had  ever  seen.  Doctor 
Brainard  said: 

"You  were  having  a  game,  weren't  you?" 

"Just  coming  in."  John  reflected :  "He  looks 
too  bright  for  me  to  tell  him  now;  I  guess  I'll 
wait  till  I  get  to  Syracuse  at  Christmas." 

The  two  sat  down  together  in  the  window, 
29 


FIRST   LOVE 

where,  without,  they  could  see  the  fellows 
coming  in  from  different  parts  of  the  ground, 
over  which  a  light  fall  of  snow  had  left  a  fine 
powder.  Doctor  Brainard  glanced  at  the  white, 
lifeless  representation  of  the  boy's  warm,  live, 
young  face. 

"I've  come  to  tell  you  a  little  piece  of  news, 
John." 

A  little  bit  of  news  like  this,  if  it  had  been 
brought  to  Doctor  Brainard  when  he  was  a 
boy  at  school;  if  he  had  possessed  the  income 
he  was  about  to  announce  to  John,  he  might 
have  married  the  woman  whose  lineaments  he 
could  now  trace  in  her  son.  In  which  case 
there  wouldn't  have  been  any  John  Bennett. 
The  doctor  was  getting  muddled. 

"Peter  Bathurst  has  asked  me  to  go  up  to 
the  Adirondacks  with  him  for  the  Christmas 
holidays.  I  think  I'd  rather  like  to  go  if  you 
think — "  John  stopped. 

"You  mean,  if  I  think  you  can  afford  it?" 

"Yes,  that's  it,"  John  nodded. 

30 


A   WINDFALL 

The  doctor  sat  back  and  looked  at  him 
kindly. 

"Your  father  took  some  shares  in  a  mine  in 
1 8 — .  He  was  the  only  man  in  Syracuse  that 
did  so.  When  he  failed  the  stock  couldn't  be 
sold  for  two  dollars  a  share,  and  he  bought  it 
somewhere  around  twenty-five." 

John  listened ;  he  had  heard  so  many  attacks 
on  that  dear  memory — on  his  father's  extrava- 
gance and  prodigality.  He  loved  his  recollec- 
tions of  the  gallant  gentleman,  to  whom  money 
was  a  commodity  and  not  a  thing  of  import- 
ance, and  which  he  could  no  more  make  or 
hoard  than  he  could  have  made  or  hoarded  the 
air.  He  frowned  here  with  some  expectation 
of  an  attack. 

"Yesterday,"  the  doctor  went  on,  "I  sold 
the  stock  out  at  two  hundred.  There  are  a  few 
old  debts  which  you  will  want  to  pay,  although 
they  are  outlawed.  This  transaction  makes 
you  worth  about  fifty  thousand  dollars." 

John  smiled. 

31 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Gosh!"  he  said  under  his  breath,  and  struck 
his  pockets  to  feel  for  the  bills  which,  like 
love-letters,  had  clung  to  him  for  months. 

"I  shall  invest  it  for  you  in  government 
bonds  and  mortgages,  and  in  the  four  years 
before  your  majority  I  hope  I  shall  have  added 
to  your  capital." 

"Then,"  the  boy  spoke  with  what  uncon- 
cern he  could,  "might  I  have  a  little  money 
now?" 

Doctor  Brainard  had  been  prepared  for  this 
demand. 

"I  brought  up  a  little  for  you,  and  you  can 
go  with  Peter  Bathurst  to  the  woods  if  you 
like." 

"Oh,  it's  all  right  about  that"  returned  the 
heir  impatiently.  "All  I  want  is  a  little  cash." 

"How  much?" 

"Oh,  about  two  hundred  dollars." 

His  friend  started.  "I've  brought  twenty- 
five  dollars  with  me,"  he  said  severely.  "It's 
more  than  you  have  ever  had  at  one  time,  and 
32 


A   WINDFALL 

you'll  have  to  get  along  with  that  for  true  pres- 
ent." 

And  Bennett,  who  had  come  into  a  little 
fortune,  and  who  had  laid  all  manner  of  noble 
plans  about  working  out  his  college  education, 
accepted  the  roll  of  bills  which  the  doctor  put 
into  his  hand  without  further  protest.  And 
when  the  old  gentleman  had  taken  his  leave, 
Bennett  found  himself  gloomily  staring  out 
into  the  November  night,  very  little  richer  than 
he  had  been  before,  and  with  his  debts  still 
hanging  like  Damocles'  sword  over  his  head. 


33 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  LADY 

THERE  is  no  more  lovely  part  of  New 
York  state  than  a  certain  wide  valley 
with  its  sweeping  fields,  its  gentle  incline,  its 
harvesting  meadows,  and  hunting  country,  and 
as  such  it  is  appreciated  to  the  utmost,  and  its 
landscape  is  splashed  with  scarlet  coats,  its 
echoes  roused  by  the  horn,  its  furrows,  ditches, 
and  hedges  shot  over  by  horse  and  hound  from 
the  first  of  the  season  to  its  close.  There  is  the 
worship  and  cult  for  the  horse  in  Tallahoe 
Valley,  and  in  this  age  of  locomotion  by  steam 
and  rail  it  is  a  pleasure  to  find  oneself  in  a 
region  where  horse-flesh  is  cultivated,  and 
where  the  motor  may  not  pass  under  penalty 
of  the  law. 

There  are  fine  old  houses  hereabouts,  and 
fine  new  houses,  and  the  atmosphere  is  English 
34 


THE   LADY 

in  its  pastoral  and  sporting  character,  and  in 
its  entertainments.  Among  other  properties 
the  Bathurst  place  is  colonial,  and  stands 
proudly  on  a  little  hill  with  something  like  six 
hundred  acres  of  farm  and  pasture  land  around 
it. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  sat  in  her  dressing-room 
before  the  window  which  gives  to  the  west. 
The  October  morning  promised  rain.  Above 
the  trees  she  could  see  the  gray  skies,  across 
whose  threatening  face  drifted  a  few  clouds, 
their  edges  rimmed  with  gold.  The  house  was 
full  of  young  people,  her  sons'  college  friends 
and  two  or  three  strikingly  pretty  creatures 
whom  she  had  asked  from  Washington  "to 
form  her  stepsons'  taste,"  as  she  had  said, 
writing  to  her  Washington  chum,  when  invit- 
ing the  debutante  of  the  past  season,  Cynthia 
Forsythe,  to  come  to  Tallahoe  for  the  horse 
show. 

They  had  arrived  the  day  before,  and  the 
35 


FIRST   LOVE 

hostess  had  barely  seen  them,  for  from  the  time 
of  their  arrival  they  had  been  either  in  the  sad- 
dle or  driving,  or  tramping  short  ten-mile 
jaunts,  as  is  the  fashion  of  the  Valley. 

In  the  loveliness  of  the  Valley  in  October  the 
lady's  enthusiasm  for  her  native  state  returned. 
She  had  unpacked  her  trunks  and  made  the 
tour  of  her  house  only  three  days  before.  She 
had  seen  from  every  window  the  framed 
pictures  of  lawn  and  forests,  and,  above  all, 
after  a  tour  of  her  stables,  her  approval  reached 
its  height,  and  a  ride  across  country  on  her 
favorite  mare  capped  the  climax. 

She  had  been  in  Europe  twelve  years,  and 
had  not  realized  how  American  she  really  was, 
or  how  she  loved  her  state,  until  now,  with  its 
brisk  air  beating  her  cheeks,  the  spice  and  per- 
fume of  the  autumn  in  the  wind,  and  the  vague 
scent  of  the  forest  fires. 

As  she  sat  before  her  window  her  husband 
entered  in  his  riding  clothes,  his  crop  in  his 
hand,  his  white  stock  rumpled,  his  face  red  as 
36 


THE   LADY 

a  convolvulus.  Peter  Bathurst,  Senior,  had 
the  air  of  an  upper  groom ;  his  boots  were  not 
over-clean,  and  he  brought  an  odor  of  the 
stables  with  him. 

"It's  a  bang-up  show,"  he  told  his  wife,  tak- 
ing a  paper  out  of  his  pocket.  "In  this  fourth 
class,  for  instance,  where  Ladybird  is  entered, 
it's  a  toss-up  who  will  get  the  ribbon ;  and  I've 
never  seen  finer  horses  in  my  life,  not  even  in 
Ireland." 

"Who's  to  ride  Ladybird,  after  all?"  asked 
Mrs.  Bathurst. 

"That  Bennett  chap." 

"But  he  hasn't  come,  I  thought." 

"Oh,  he's  been  here  since  early  morning," 
said  her  husband  curtly.  "If  you  shut  your- 
self up  here  for  hours,  Virginia — if  you  fetch 
your  continental  custom  of  eating  in  bed  and 
dawdling  about  till  noon  in  America — why, 
you'll  miss  half  the  show.  And  if  you  play 
the  off-stander  like  this  the  people  here  will 
think  you're  giving  yourself  airs." 

37 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Off-stander !"  she  echoed,  remembering 
how  her  heart  had  thrilled  to  every  inch  of 
home.  "I've  been  really  tired  out  from  my 
long  ride  yesterday,  Peter.  It's  a  century,  you 
know,  since  I've  been  on  a  horse." 

"You  didn't  look  like  a  tenderfoot!"  He 
grudgingly  remembered  how  she  had  regained 
her  seat  in  a  trice,  like  the  good  horsewoman 
she  was.  "You'll  hold  your  own,  all  right, 
even  with  these  girls.  I  think  if  one  of  them 
giggles  again  I'll  curse !  Come  on  down-stairs, 
won't  you?  We'll  want  something  to  drink 
before  we  start." 

His  wife  gave  a  lingering  look  at  the  land- 
scape and  left  her  lounge. 

"I  think  I'll  dress  first,  then  I  shan't  need  to 
come  up  again." 

"What's  the  matter  with  you  as  you  are,  for 
Heaven's  sake?" 

"Will  I  do?" 

He  laughed  harshly. 

"Where  do  you  think  you  are?  At  Long- 
38 


THE   LADY 

champs  or  Ascot?  Don't  you  remember  the 
Valley  horse  show?" 

For  answer  she  picked  up  a  hat  which,  with 
its  veil,  lay  on  a  table  at  her  side,  and  pinned 
both  on  as  she  stood.  She  took  as  well  a  pair 
of  long  chamois  gloves,  drawing  them  between 
her  hands. 

"Come,"  she  said  quietly,  "I  am  quite  ready 
to  go  down."  And  her  husband  went  before 
her,  muttering  something  about  woman's  eter- 
nal vanity  and  waste  of  time. 

The  giggle  which  had  offended  Bathurst 
broke  silver-like  from  the  group  at  the  end  of 
the  big  room  into  which,  preceded  by  her  hus- 
band, the  lady  of  the  house  entered. 

There  was  much  beauty  in  the  little  group. 
Cynthia  Forsythe  had  made  a  sensation  in 
Washington  the  year  before,  and  her  two 
friends  were  charming  seconds. 

Peter  and  Jack  Bathurst,  in  riding  clothes, 
lingered  about  the  group,  admiring  the  flowers 
of  these  young  faces,  like  gardeners  waiting 

39 


FIRST   LOVE 

to  choose  before  culling  the  roses,  already  con- 
noisseurs of  the  types  they  each  preferred. 

"Mrs.  Bathurst!"  one  of  the  girls  cried. 
"I'm  so  glad  your  head  is  better  and  that  you 
are  coming,  and  I  hope  Ladybird  will  win 
everything !" 

Cynthia  Forsythe,  the  daughter  of  her  dear- 
est friend,  had  been  in  Mrs.  Bathurst's  mind 
for  her  eldest  stepson.  The  Washington  debu- 
tante turned  adoring  eyes  on  the  older  woman, 
the  eyes  of  frank  youth  willing  to  admire 
without  stint  until  a  man  comes  along  to 
awaken  jealousy.  She  put  her  arm  about 
Mrs.  Bathurst's  waist. 

"How  sweet  you  look!"  she  murmured. 
"And  what  a  darling  dress!" 

Mr.  Bathurst  grinned.  "Yes,  she  was  going 
to  change  it  if  I  hadn't  put  my  foot  down.  I 
believe  she  changes  her  dresses  every  hour. 
She  used  to  in  Paris,  at  any  rate." 

Miss  Forsythe  looked  at  her  host  with  dis- 
approval, and  said  sharply : 
40 


THE   LADY 

"Well,  I'm  sure  each  dress  has  been  prettier 
than  the  last." 

"Where  is  Mr.  John  Bennett?"  asked  the 
hostess  of  her  stepsons. 

"Down  at  the  show.  He's  crazy  about  Lady- 
bird, he  says  she  has  a  walk-over." 

Mrs.  Bathurst  smiled.  "I  hope  he's  right. 
It's  really  too  bad  Peter  can't  ride  the  mare 
himself." 

"And  why  doesn't  he?"  asked  Miss  For- 
sythe. 

"Game  leg  or  foot,"  answered  Jack  indif- 
ferently. "And  father  could  no  more  ride 
straight  in  a  show  than  he  could  ride  crooked 
out  of  it.  Nervous." 

"And  is  your  friend  nervous?"  Mrs.  Bath- 
urst asked,  and  Jack  roared. 

"John!  He's  got  iron  nerves,  and  if  any 
one  can  pull  the  mare  through,  he  can." 

Bathurst,  who  had  left  the  room,  here  put 
his  head  in  at  the  door. 

"It's  raining,  and  the  traps  are  all  here.    If 


FIRST   LOVE 

nobody's  going  on  to  the  show,  I  shall  send 
them  back  to  the  stables." 

Mrs.  Bathurst  found  herself  in  the  buck- 
board  with  Cynthia  Forsythe. 

"How  do  you  like  this  happy-go-lucky  sport- 
ing country,  Cynnie?" 

"I  love  it!" 

"So  do  I,  every  tree  and  blade  and  rod  of 
it!" 

"You've  been  away  so  long!" 

"Yes,  but  it's  all  the  better  to  come  back  to 
now." 

Cynthia  Forsythe  was  thinking  to  herself: 

"How  can  she  find  anything  nice  either  here 
or  in  Europe  with  that  brute  of  a  husband?" 

Her  mother  had  warned  her,  but  the  big, 
red-faced  man,  with  his  rude  remarks  before 
company,  and  his  covert  attempts  to  kiss  her 
and  take  her  hand,  was  worse  than  she  had 
feared.  Cynthia,  who  had  not  turned  nineteen, 
thought  to  herself,  "How  beautiful  Mrs.  Bath- 
urst must  have  been  when  she  was  young!" 
42 


THE   LADY 

Young,  poor  dear!  The  girl  couldn't  measure 
the  power  of  ripe  beauty  by  her  side,  in  com- 
parison with  which  her  own  frail  charms  were 
like  the  unmellow  promise  of  early  fruit,  and 
sure  to  be  sharp  to  the  taste. 

"Mr.  Bennett  told  me  that  he  had  been  here 
once  when  he  was  a  little  boy,"  she  said.  "He 
remembers  every  stick  and  stone.  You  haven't 
seen  him  yet,  have  you?" 

"No;  he  came  after  I  had  gone  up-stairs." 

"He's  perfectly  fascinating!"  the  girl  said 
enthusiastically.  "Such  a  good-looking,  charm- 
ing fellow.  I  do  hope  he'll  get  the  ribbon." 

"I  do  hope,"  said  Mrs.  Bathurst,  "that  he 
will  keep  Ladybird's  head  up  at  the  hurdles, 
for  she  has  a  lot  of  horrid  tricks  which  one 
would  never  suspect;  and  if  John  Bennett  lets 
her  graze  the  wood,  I  pity  him  with  my  hus- 
band ! 

"Stop  here!"  she  directed  her  coachman. 
"It's  as  good  a  position  as  we'll  be  likely  to 
find,  late  as  we  are." 

43 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  HORSE  SHOW 

MRS.  BATHURST  found  the  scene 
around  her  agreeable,  gay,  and  charm- 
ing. There  was  a  simplicity,  an  easy-going  con- 
tent in  the  Valley  people,  and  in  their  enjoy- 
ment of  their  annual  show.  Every  one  was  in 
the  best  of  humor.  Glancing  from  face  to  face, 
remarking  those  people  with  whom  she  had 
been  bred  and  associated,  and  who  had  changed 
so  from  those  early  days,  knowing  their  scan- 
dals and  their  tragedies,  and  the  worldliness 
of  their  lives,  she  saw  their  good  spirits  and 
their  animation  and  their  composure  and  phil- 
osophical acceptance  of  life  in  this  conven- 
tional front  which  they  presented  to  the  world. 
The  sun  had  decided  to  shine,  and  the  turf, 
enclosed  by  its  rope  fencing,  was  soft  and 
44 


THE   HORSE    SHOW 

green.  The  villagers  crowded  down  to  it;  line 
after  line  of  vehicles  covered  the  fields,  and 
wheels  and  covered  carriages,  ponies  and  hacks, 
buckboards,  drags  and  rockaways  crowded  the 
meadows. 

The  pride  of  the  state  was  there  in  first-rate 
specimens  of  horse-flesh,  and  in  the  shape  of 
good-looking  men  and  women.  The  scene  was 
not  foreign  in  the  least,  it  was  purely  Amer- 
ican, with  just  a  touch  of  cosmopolitanism  to 
keep  it  from  provincialism.  Everything  looked 
delightful  to  Mrs.  Bathurst.  She  felt  a  warm 
liking  for  her  own  country-people;  the  air, 
crisp  and  fragrant,  as  it  came  up  from  the  sod 
and  from  across  the  meadows,  did  her  good 
with  its  fresh  vigor.  j 

She  regarded  with  satisfaction  her  acquaint- 
ances, nodding  and  waving  to  them;  she  sat 
up  straight  and  well  on  the  seat  of  her  little 
carriage,  her  arm  along  the  back?  and  her  head 
on  her  hand.  She  couldn't  say  she  felt  young 
again,  for  she  had  never  felt  old  or  indifferent. 
45 


FIRST   LOVE 

Indeed,  she  felt  buoyant,  and  as  nearly  happy 
as  possible  under  the  circumstances.  She  went 
over,  heart  and  soul,  to  the  Valley,  to  old  times 
and  old  scenes,  to  the  new  ones,  and  twelve 
years  of  foreign  existence,  their  weary  experi- 
ences, their  tides,  their  gaiety  and  balls,  their 
fetes  that  had  pushed  and  pulled  her  along 
— filled  in,  filled  up — demanded  much  and 
given  little  in  exchange,  faded  and  wore 
away.  The  years  she  measured  had  claimed  a 
great  deal  of  her  soul — all  was  shut  away  from 
her  now  by  the  effect  that  home  and  her  own 
country  had  made  on  her,  and  her  eyes,  smiling 
and  cordial,  were  clear  as  the  afternoon,  which 
finally  shone  on  the  scene. 

Her  husband,  many  of  whose  horses  were 
in  the  show,  was  down  by  the  judges'  stand. 
But  she  did  not  linger  in  her  observation  of  his 
figure  long.  Her  stepsons  were  both  riding  and 
driving  in  the  different  entries,  and  were  off 
with  the  grooms  at  the  far  end  of  the  field. 
The  class  of  four-year-old  hunters  had  just 
46 


THE   HORSE   SHOW 

come  on,  and  she  consulted  her  catalogue  to 
see  if  every  one  had  qualified. 

She  was  not  to  be  permitted  to  view  the 
scene  alone  for  very  long.  People  called  to  her 
and  beckoned  from  the  other  carriages,  and, 
coming  toward  her  as  quickly  as  he  could  make 
his  way  through  the  crowd,  she  saw  a  man 
whom  she  had  known  all  her  life,  and  who 
she  knew  would  not  let  her  leave  his  side  again 
so  long  as  she  remained  in  the  field.  The  gentle- 
man had  left  his  place  on  his  coach,  and  even 
from  a  distance  Mrs.  Bathurst  could  see  the 
pleasure  on  his  face  at  sight  of  her.  She  sighed, 
changed  her  position,  and  when  he  came  up  she 
had  lost  something  of  her  superabundant 
gaiety. 

"By  Jove!"  he  said,  greeting  her,  standing 
by  her  wheel.  "I  came  up  from  Albany  yester- 
day to  the  show,  but  I  had  no  idea  it  would  be 
as  good  as  this,  you  know." 

"You  think  the  average  is  fair  ?" 
"Confound  the  horses !    I  think  it's  the  most 
47 


FIRST   LOVE 

wonderful  sight  to  see  you  again;  but  it's 
twelve  years,  my  dear  woman !" 

"I  believe  it  is." 

"I  know.  I  have  counted,"  he  said  mean- 
ingly. "And  I've  heard,  too,  of  your  goings-on 
in  foreign  parts.  You  had  something  like  a 
jubilee." 

She  looked  above  him  at  the  clear  sky  and 
over  the  gay  crowd. 

"This  is  a  jubilee,"  she  said.  "I  assure  you 
it  is  the  nicest  thing  I've  done  or  seen  in  twelve 
years." 

Nicholas  Pyrnne  was  in  congress.  He  loved 
his  own  country,  and  he  exclaimed  with  real 
pleasure : 

"Honestly,  do  you  mean  that?  Aren't  you 
expatriated  yet  ?" 

"I  feel  as  though  I  had  never  been  farther 
than  Buffalo." 

"Jolly !  But  you  were  always  gracious,  Vir- 
ginia. I  guess  you're  laughing  at  us." 

He  leaned  toward  her,  and,  quite  indifferent 
48 


THE    HORSE    SHOW 

as  to  how  marked  his  interest  might  appear, 
"You  don't  know  how  fine  it  sounds,"  he 
whispered,  "to  hear  you  speak  again.  It's  like 
music!  Something  must  call  you  up  here  in 
the  state,  though?"  His  scrutiny  was  curious. 

But  she  returned  his  look  quietly  with  clear 
eyes. 

"The  whole  thing  calls  me." 

"But  how  about  Monte  Carlo,  and  Paris,  and 
Homburg?" 

She  shook  her  head. 

"Tallahoe  and  the  annual  horse-show — noth- 
ing else." 

"But  just  think  of  the  Grand  Prix  or  the 
Derby." 

"I  don't  want  to,"  she  replied.  "I  don't  wish 
to  think  of  anything  but  the  Valley." 

"Bully!"  he  breathed  in  ecstasy.  "Bully! 
You  look,  Virginia — " 

But  here  she  put  her  hand  up  preventingly. 

"You'll  spoil  everything  if  you  make  it  per- 
sonal. Tell  me,"  she  pursued,  leaning  forward 
49 


FIRST   LOVE 

and  searching  the  crowd,  "where  is  the  man 
who  is  to  ride  Peter's  Ladybird?" 

"I  don't  know,"  said  the  Honorable  Nich- 
olas. "I  thought  Peter  was  to  ride  his  own 
horse." 

"He  has  both  gout  and  nerves,"  said  his 
wife.  "One  of  the  boys'  friends,  John  Ben- 
nett, is  to  take  Ladybird  around." 

"Bennett,"  Pyrnne  asked,  "the  son  of  poor 
Fred  Bennett  of  Syracuse  ?" 

"Yes." 

"Well,  if  he  has  his  father's  ill-luck,  poor 
chap,  he'll  come  a  cropper,  all  right.  It  was 
enough  for  Fred  to  look  at  a  scheme  to  have  it 
go  to  bits  the  next  day,  I  remember." 

"When  I  saw  him  last,"  Mrs.  Bathurst  said, 
"I  mean  the  boy,  he  was  in  knickerbockers — 
he  had  red  hair.  He  spent  a  Sunday  over  here 
in  the  Valley." 

"There's  Peter!  That's  his  horse!"  Pyrnne 
indicated.  "If  the  other  horses  in  this  class 
are  as  good  as  Bathurst's  mare,  it's  a  pretty 
50 


Why,  he's   a   man,   a   magnificent   man!"     Page   51 


THE   HORSE   SHOW 

good  show  all  around.  There!"  he  went  on, 
"that  must  be  your  friend  standing  by  Bathurst. 
Knickerbockers  and  red  hair,  he  hasn't 
changed." 

Mrs.  Bathurst  followed  his  indications  and 
saw  the  giant  in  his  breeches  and  riding-boots. 

"Heavens!"  she  exclaimed.  "If  they  have 
all  grown  like  that,  Nick,  what  have  I  changed 
to  ?  Why,  he's  a  man,  a  magnificent  man !" 

She  put  her  lorgnon  up,  though  she  didn't 
need  it. 

"Twelve  years  work  all  kinds  of  tricks," 
Nicholas  Pyrnne  said  comfortingly.  "I've 
grown  fat  and  turned  forty." 

"Oh,  hush,"  she  said;  "hush!" 

"And  you,"  he  continued,  lowering  his  voice, 
"have  grown — " 

But  here  Mrs.  Bathurst  called  to  the  girl  who 
had  come  toward  her  carriage. 

"Cynthia,  get  in  here,  will  you?     This  is 
Mr.     Nicholas     Pyrnne — Miss     Forsythe    of 
Washington.    I  think  you  knew  her  mother — 
Si 


FIRST  LOVE 

Cynthia  Fielding.  I  want  you  all  to  rally 
around  me  while  Ladybird  runs  for  the  Valley 
Cup." 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  RACE 

BENNETT  knew  that  he  had  more  or  less 
of  a  thankless  task  to  perform  in  riding 
Ladybird  for  her  choleric  owner.  If  she  won 
anything  at  all  it  would  be  thanks  to  the  horse ; 
and  if  she  didn't  get  a  mention  it  would  as  nat- 
urally be  his  fault.  Bathurst  had  been  charm- 
ing to  the  young  man  when  he  arrived  that 
morning,  late  by  twenty-four  hours,  on  ac- 
count of  a  railway  wreck  at  Buffalo;  and  noth- 
ing of  the  host's  sharp  manner  to  his  sons, 
rudeness  to  the  servants,  were  reflected  in  his 
attitude  toward  the  young  college  man,  al- 
though these  things  bore  out  Bathurst's  repu- 
tation for  being  a  vulgar  tartar. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  he  had  not  seen  at  all.    The 
woman  who  had  charmed  his  boy  eyes,  who 
53 


FIRST    LOVE 

had  given  him  such  pretty  proof  of  heart  and 
understanding,  had  become  a  dream  to  John. 
She  was  a  memory  he  shrank  from,  because  it 
meant  that  he  must  recall  with  poignant  ache 
the  auction  day  and  the  accompanying  horrors 
which  even  the  fact  of  his  brief  holiday  at 
Bathurst  House,  his  father's  rifle,  and  her  kind- 
ness could  not  make  him  forget. 

He  had  had  his  own  affairs,  and  they  had 
followed  one  on  another  with  amazing  rapid- 
ity. Since  little  Milly,  there  had  been  other 
blue  eyes,  other  beauties,  and  John  discovered 
himself  to  be  a  fickle  lover,  restless  in  his 
courtships  and  too  volatile  and  easily  turned  to 
a  new  beauty.  But  during  the  past  two  years 
he  had  been  fancy  free,  calling  himself  already 
a  cynic,  aping  the  older  men,  developing  a  diffi- 
cult taste,  and  thinking  himself  a  misogynist. 
Of  course,  it  only  made  him  perfectly  fasci- 
nating, as  Cynthia  Forsythe  had  said,  and  John 
was  in  danger  of  being  well  spoiled,  if  it  had 
not  been  for  his  sports — his  riding,  shooting, 
54 


THE   RACE 

the  outdoor  life  in  which  he  reveled.  The 
fresh  air,  the  breeze,  the  exercise  and  the  skill 
were  the  making  of  him  mentally  and  physic- 
ally, and  for  just  the  right  period  of  his  youth 
turned  his  thoughts  away  from  woman  and 
toward  nature  for  a  time ;  the  gentler  sex  was 
out  of  his  thoughts.  Here  at  Bathurst  House 
the  beautiful  mare,  Ladybird,  interested  him 
more  than  Cynthia  Forsythe  with  her  laugh, 
which  Bathurst  called  a  silly  giggle;  and  John 
had  not  even  looked  toward  the  other  girls  in 
the  party. 

Back  of  the  line  of  fine  old  elms  that  bor- 
dered the  village  street  in  Tallahoe,  the  Big 
Tree  Inn  nestled  white,  with  its  green  blinds, 
small  window-panes,  and  hospitable  doors. 
John  had  put  up  there,  for  the  Bathursts'  house 
was  full,  and  he  had  been  rather  glad  of  the 
fact,  because  he  had  greater  independence ;  and 
really,  as  he  said  to  himself,  he  didn't  want  to 
bother  with  the  girls.  Back  here  in  the  Valley, 
after  twelve  years,  everything  came  to  him  like 
55 


FIRST   LOVE 

an  old  experience.  The  drive  over  from  the 
station  to  the  house  had  been  shorter  than  he 
recalled,  for  then  they  had  seemed  to  drive  for 
ever  through  the  spring  night  in  the  tall  cart. 
The  forest,  the  lanes,  and  the  big  snowy  front- 
age of  the  pillared  house  were  all  smaller,  for 
it  had  seemed  to  John  then  like  a  castle  set  in 
an  enchanted  wood.  And  Mrs.  Bathurst — well, 
he  couldn't  remember  quite  how  she  looked. 

As  John  stood  down  by  Ladybird  on  the 
show  grounds — Mr.  Bathurst,  Peter,  and  Jack 
rowing  and  going  on — Peter,  with  his  blue  rib- 
bon won  for  roadsters  on  his  lapel,  John  Ben- 
nett felt  that  in  riding  Ladybird  he  was  going 
to  do  a  stroke  for  the  family.  Neither  of  the 
sons  of  the  house  had  been  allowed  to  ride 
Bathurst's  favorite  mare,  and  the  sole  and  only 
reason  that  John  came  in  for  this  distinction 
was  because  the  year  before  Bathurst  had  seen 
him  ride  at  Syracuse  in  the  state  fair.  John  had 
made  a  peerless  record  with  his  own  colt,  and 
56 


THE   RACE 

had  won  himself  some  distinction  as  a  rider 
and  owner. 

He  felt  a  great  responsibility  and  pride  about 
the  whole  thing,  he  had  never  had  a  family 
that  he  could  remember  himself;  now  Peter 
and  Jack  and  the  old  man,  as  they  called  their 
father,  and  some  indistinct  idea  of  a  lady,  made 
a  little  household  for  him,  and  he  was  repre- 
senting it.  He  got  into  his  saddle,  felt  the  fine 
supple  body  of  the  mare  between  his  knees,  led 
her  gently  off  the  tender  grass,  and  the  pride 
of  his  next  few  minutes  and  what  he  thought 
would  be  his  sure  success  sent  his  young  blood 
sparkling  through  his  veins  like  wine. 

"That's  our  trap  over  there,"  Peter  Bathurst 
told  him,  "there  by  the  yellow  coach."  And 
John  glanced  to  see  that  it  had  the  effect  of 
being  full  of  flowers;  but  he  only  recognized 
Cynthia  Forsythe,  and  not  the  taller  figure  by 
her  side. 

When  he  took  Ladybird  around  the  course 
she  came  her  five  hurdles  like  the  bird  she  was, 

57 


FIRST   LOVE 

lightly,  and,  following  a  gelding,  she  seemed 
especially  featherweight  and  made  out  of  the 
air.  It  was  a  foregone  conclusion,  John  felt  it. 
So  did  the  others  who  watched  him — the  spec- 
tators, and  the  judges,  and  Peter  Bathurst,  as, 
legs  well  apart,  hands  in  his  pockets,  an  unlit 
cigar  between  his  teeth,  he  stood  smiling  with 
nervous  assurance,  and  thinking  how  much  he 
would  like  that  big  blond  jockey  for  his  son. 

John,  "riding  for  his  family"  as  a  whim 
made  him  call  them,  passed  Ladybird's  owner 
like  thistledown,  passed  the  judges  as  well,  who 
were  absorbed  in  their  anxiety  to  be  perfectly 
unprejudiced  before  the  sight  of  such  splendid 
style  and  strain,  and  such  an  exhibition  of 
horse-flesh,  and  such  an  exhibition  of  riding. 
John,  riding  for  his  family,  as  he  passed  them 
all,  swallowed  the  golden  draft  of  success,  with 
flushed  cheeks  and  kindling  eyes,  and  the  last 
time  round  he  glanced  in  the  direction  the 
Bathurst  boys  had  indicated,  and  saw  Mrs. 
Peter  Bathurst  standing  up  in  the  trap.  He 
58 


THE   RACE 

saw  her  in  that  brief  second  between  the  hur- 
dles, she  was  looking  at  him.  He  remembered 
then  how  she  used  to  look.  The  memory  was 
strong.  Never  having  admitted  the  thought  of 
her,  in  his  naive  innocence,  how  was  he  to 
know,  as  he  should  draw  the  latch,  the  great 
emotion  would  rush  on  him  and  bear  him 
down  ? 

With  that  one  quick  sight  of  the  lady, 
caught  between  hurdles,  with  the  wave  of  her 
hand  at  him  and  her  "brava !"  he  knew  that  he 
was  riding  for  her,  for  the  lady  herself.  The 
blood  rushed  from  his  heart  to  his  cheeks,  his 
breast  gave  a  big  throb,  he  reached  the  hurdle 
unprepared  for  it,  because,  sportsman  that  he 
was,  he  had  never  gone  into  any  field  with  a 
tormenting  thought  of  a  woman  in  his  mind, 
and  the  sudden  commotion  communicated  it- 
self to  the  sensitive  Ladybird.  Bennett  thought 
she  was  going  to  refuse  the  hurdle,  and  he 
sickened,  but  no !  she  rose  for  it,  then  retrieved, 
if  one  may  so  say,  seemed  to  strike  it  with  all 
59 


FIRST   LOVE 

fours,  foundered,  got  tangled  up,  lost  her  per- 
fect method,  lost  herself  and  fell;  and  John 
fell  with  her,  and  the  hurdle,  and  the  horse  and 
the  earth  all  struck  him  and  poured  themselves 
over  him.  But  even  before  he  lost  his  senses, 
shame  poured  over  him  blackest  and  deadliest 
of  all. 

When  John  finally  opened  his  eyes  he  was 
lying  under  a  tree,  and  the  first  thing  he  saw 
was  the  west  red  with  a  brilliant  sunset.  The 
dizzy  faintness  that  was  leaving  him  for  a  bit 
was  more  deathlike  than  sharp  pain  would  have 
been.  His  forehead  was  cold,  for  there  was  a 
wet  linen  on  it,  and  one  of  his  hands  felt  full  of 
sawdust.  He  squeezed  it,  and  the  sensation  told 
him  that  he  pressed  a  human  hand,  soft  as  the 
breast  of  a  bird.  He  turned  his  eyes  to  the  di- 
rection and  saw  something  which,  after  a  great 
many  years,  brought  back  to  him  the  memory 
of  things  he  loved,  of  things  that  used  to  make 
him  cry  when  he  was  a  youngster,  and  make 
him  awfully  happy  as  well.  He  was  far  too  in- 
fo 


.    -   * 


It  was  only  the  face  of  a  woman  above  him.     Page  61 


THE   RACE 

jured  and  bruised  and  broken  to  know  what  it 
was  that  he  saw,  to  know  that  it  was  only  the 
face  of  a  woman  bending  above  him,  and  that 
after  twelve  years  he  was  looking  at  Virginia 
Bathurst  again. 


61 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  REASON 

THE  first  thought  he  was  conscious  of 
forming,  as  he  lay  in  the  little  room  in 
the  Big  Tree  Inn,  where  he  had  been  carried, 
was  the  thought  of  his  father.  There  are  cer- 
tain natures  which  avoid  by  instinct  those  mem- 
ories which  bring  pain.  No  matter  how  salu- 
tary and  dear  those  memories  are,  if  they  are 
likely  to  bring  tears,  they  are  put  gently  and 
firmly  away  from  the  mind. 

John — young,  gay,  and  keen  for  happiness 
— loved  the  things  that  brought  him  joy,  and 
hated  even  to  cast  his  eyes  toward  melancholy. 
During  these  twelve  years  the  image  of  Mrs. 
Bathurst  had  not  come  often  to  him.  He 
would  never  let  himself  think  of  her,  any  more 
than  he  would  ever  let  himself  think  of  his 
62 


THE   REASON 

dead.  But  on  this  afternoon  he  was  not  master 
of  the  first  conscious  image  that  came  across 
his  reawakening  brain.  He  found  his  bed  in 
front  of  a  window  from  which  the  shade  had 
been  raised,  and  through  which  the  outside 
world  shone  bright  with  sunlight.  He  could 
see  people  passing  along  the  village  streets 
under  the  great  oaks ;  he  could  even  see  across 
the  road  the  roof  of  the  post-office  building 
behind  the  trees. 

He  was  out  of  danger.  He  was  bandaged  to 
his  eyes  where  Ladybird's  hoofs  had  cut  a 
circular  sway ;  he  was  bandaged  about  the  legs 
and  ribs.  He  had  been  conscious  off  and  on 
without  forming  any  consecutive  thought  until 
now. 

There  was  no  one  in  the  room. 

"Father  was  always  unlucky,"  he  reflected. 
"He  seemed  to  have  the  worst  kind  of  luck 
all  through.  I  wonder  if  I'm  going  on  in  the 
same  way,  for  this  thing  here  has  been  the 
deuce  of  a  muddle.  Damn  that  horse  I"  Al- 
63 


FIRST    LOVE 

though  he  was  extremely  weak  the  blood 
rushed  into  his  cheek.  "Damn  my  own  foolish- 
ness!" 

He  thought  of  the  points  of  the  little  mare. 
What  a  bird  she  was!  How  well  she  had 
promised,  and  how  well  she  would  have  per- 
formed if  it  had  not  been  for  him!  His  father 
had  been  a  rider,  a  judge  of  horses;  he  had 
made  his  sensations  in  Syracuse — won  his  rib- 
bons long  before  John's  advent  on  the  scene. 
His  father  would  have  been  ashamed  of  him 
on  this  day.  He  had  funked,  ridden  like  a  fool 
— he  had  ruined  another  man's  horse. 

"She  must  be  crippled  if  she's  alive,"  he 
thought.  What  would  the  Bathurst  fellows 
think?  What  would  Mr.  Bathurst  say?  He 
winced.  So  far  as  the  value  of  the  horse  was 
concerned,  if  he  would  attempt  to  make  good 
it  would  cost  him  considerably  over  his  year's 
income. 

He  couldn't  remember  whether  any  one  had 
been  in  to  see  him  as  he  lay  here,  and  as 
64 


THE   REASON 

he  continued  to  set  his  thoughts  in  order,  his 
blue  eyes  peering  between  the  white  bandages, 
the  reason  came  of  a  sudden  to  him  why  he 
had  missed  his  hurdle,  and  he  felt  an  insane  re- 
sentment against  the  reason. 

He  looked  like  a  thunder-cloud.  And  just 
then  Peter  Bathurst,  Junior,  came  in  for  his 
first  visit. 

"By  George,  Johnny,"  he  cried  cordially, 
"you're  sensible!" 

"Sensible  enough  to  be  mad  as  a  hornet," 
answered  the  young  man.  "And  I  guess  the 
lot  of  you  are  mad  at  me  as  well." 

"Rot!"  cried  his  chum  comprehensively. 
"What  do  you  take  us  for  ?  And  how  do  you 
feel,  anyway?" 

"Bully!"  nodded  Bennett  feebly.  "That  is, 
I  don't  feel  crazy;  and  I  suppose  that's  an  ad- 
vance, isn't  it?" 

"You'll  be  all  right  in  a  day  or  two.  The 
doctor  says  he  never  saw  ribs  and  bones  knit 
up  like  yours." 

65 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Were  they  all  busted?"  the  invalid  asked. 
And  Peter  laughed. 

"There  wasn't  one  whole  rib  left  in  you. 
They  couldn't  have  found  one  to  make  another 
Eve." 

And  here  the  other  swore  lightly.  "If  there 
had  been,  I  can  tell  you  I  wouldn't  have  let 
them  make  a  woman  out  of  it." 

"Come,"  his  friend  said  feelingly,  "you'll 
have  to  let  up  a  bit,  Johnny,  on  your  woman 
hating.  Cynthia  Forsythe's  been  staying  on 
and  on  at  the  house  for  no  earthly  reason  but 
to  see  you  when  you  are  visible." 

John  grunted,  and  Peter,  who  was  hanging 
over  the  bed  repeated: 

"Do  you  really  feel  pretty  good,  old 
chap?"  Then,  seeing  that  there  was  a  look  of 
fatigue  in  his  friend's  eyes,  he  said,  "I'll  have 
to  be  getting  on  now ;  they  told  me  only  to  stay 
five  minutes.  Nobody's  allowed  in  here,  you 
know — guarded  like  a  diamond  mine." 

John  had  not  dared  to  ask  about  the  miser- 
66 


THE   REASON 

able  event  on  the  field,  and  when  his  chum  had 
gone  he  closed  his  eyes  and  dozed  and  dreamed 
of  dashing  over  hurdles  in  a  chariot  made  out 
of  the  night,  and  with  stars  above  his  head, 
which,  as  he  looked  closer,  changed  into  the 
eyes  of  a  woman.  And  dozing  and  dreaming 
and  waking,  finding  himself  stiff  and  lame  and 
full  of  pains,  he  at  length  came  again  definitely 
into  consciousness,  and  saw  in  the  chair  at  the 
window  a  woman  sitting,  and  as  he  turned  she 
nodded,  smiling. 

"You're  a  great  deal  better,  Mr,  Bennett, 
and  we're  all  so  glad!" 

It  was  not  a  nurse.  She  had  no  hat  on,  her 
hair  was  dark  and  velvet-like,  a  white  apron 
came  up  stiffly  and  yet  softly  over  her  bosom, 
and  a  lot  of  white  stuff  lay  in  her  lap — she  had 
been  sewing.  She  folded  the  work  and  put 
it  away,  and  Bennett  watched  her.  When 
she  rose  he  saw  how  tall  she  was,  how  slim 
she  was.  The  form  of  her,  the  breast  over 
which  the  fine  apron  folded  its  snow,  her 
67 


FIRST    LOVE 

limbs  over  which  the  long  dark  blue  dress  fell, 
were  charming  for  the  eyes  of  a  young  man  to 
rest  on. 

Still  smiling,  she  came  to  the  bed,  and  he 
remembered  now  that  this  was  not  the  first 
time  he  had  watched  those  crinkling  lines 
around  her  eyes  and  mouth.  The  little  hall 
bedroom — recovered  to  his  remembrance — 
was  piled  full  of  his  father's  clothes,  and  in 
the  seclusion  he  had  cried  at  the  disposal  of  his 
household  gods.  The  shame  of  the  auction, 
which  he  had  hated  to  think  about,  gave  him 
a  twinge.  The  lady  sat  down  at  his  bedside. 
She  laid  one  of  her  hands  on  the  coverlid, 
and  John  remembered  that  it  had  rested  on  his 
father's  corduroy  hunting  coat  like  a  snow- 
flake  on  a  bit  of  brown  earth. 

But  Mrs.  Bathurst — did  he  remember  her? 
Had  he  indeed  ever  seen  her  before?  If  he  had 
never  seen  her  before  how  could  he  have  for- 
gotten her?  There  was  a  little  droop  at  the 
curve  of  her  mouth  corners;  her  cheeks  were 
68 


THE   REASON 

softly  red.  Her  eyes  were  like  velvet,  with 
pretty  little  lines  at  the  corners.  Her  dark 
hair  grew  closely  around  her  brow,  and  in  a 
pointed  peak  cutting  into  the  white  forehead. 

She  repeated,  "You're  a  great  deal  better, 
and  the  doctor  says  we  can  move  you  this 
week.  The  other  nurse  has  gone  out  for  a 
while — I'm  only  one  of  them.  And  how  do 
you  feel,  anyway?" 

"Have  you  been  taking  care  of  me?" 

"Now  and  then." 

"Well,  you're  most  awfully  kind." 

He  didn't  know  what  to  say.  He  was  em- 
barrassed— embarrassed  that  she  should  see 
him  lying  his  length  in  bed.  The  fact  that 
most  of  his  face  was  covered  up,  that  he  could 
only  move  one  arm,  that  he  was  swathed  and 
bandaged  round,  did  indeed  take  away  suffi- 
cient of  the  ordinary  circumstances  to  make 
him  feel  that  the  occasion  need  not  cause  him 
the  hot  flush  which  rose  all  through  him  at  her 
presence  there. 

69 


FIRST    LOVE 

"You  mustn't  talk,"  she  said  authoritatively. 
"I  was  sorry  not  to  welcome  you  the  day  you 
came  to  Bathurst  House.  I  wonder  if  you 
remember  that  I  saw  you  when  you  were  a 
little  boy?" 

He  did  not  answer. 

"How  long  have  I  been  knocked  up  here?" 
he  asked. 

"A  fortnight,"  she  said. 

"Mr.  Bathurst  must  hate  me — I  don't  care 
to  think  how." 

She  smiled  soothingly.  "Oh,  don't  bother 
about  such  a  thing.  He's  not  in  Tallahoe,  he's 
in  New  York." 

A  relief  came  with  her  words.  Although  he 
didn't  believe  her,  he  was  glad  to  know  that 
his  host  didn't  breathe  the  same  air  with  the 
miserable,  unsuccessful  jockey. 

"I  feel  as  if  I  oughtn't  to  be  so  spoiled," 
he  said  a  little  roughly,  "after  the  ass  I  made 
of  myself." 

"Don't  talk,"  his  nurse  commanded  again, 
70 


THE   REASON 

"don't  talk  or  I  shall  have  to  pull  down  the 
shade  and  give  you  something  to  make  you 
sleep." 

He  stirred  in  his  bandages  and  tried  to 
move  in  his  jacket  of  plaster.  With  the  life 
that  was  coming  back  to  him  the  keenest  thing 
was  the  sense  of  his  disgrace  before  them 
all. 

"Please,  Mrs.  Bathurst,  let  me  ask  a  little. 
These  things  trouble  me  when  I  get  to  sleep, 
they  come  like  nightmares.  What  does  Mr. 
Bathurst  say?" 

The  smile  on  the  face  before  him  faded. 

"Oh,  why  do  you  bother?"  she  said  rather 
impatiently.  "A  fall  like  that  might  have 
happened  to  any  man,  and  there  is  always  some 
sort  of  an  accident  at  the  show.  The  only 
thing  about  it  is  that  you  are  safe,  that  you  are 
not  killed;  that  is  the  only  question  to  be  con- 
sidered. And  one  can't  be  too  grateful  for 
that,  can  one?  And  then,  too,  as  long  as  it 
happened  afterward." 
71 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Afterward!"  he  repeated  vaguely.  "After 
what?" 

"Why,  I  mean  to  say,  after  the  show- 
after  your  entry — after  the  judging.  Of 
course  you  know  you  got  the  Ribbon.  When 
you're  better,"  she  went  on,  "you'll  tell  me, 
for  I  shall  want  to  ask  you,  why  you  kept  on 
taking  the  hurdles." 

He  closed  his  eyes,  he  was  getting  muddled. 
Of  course,  he  had  gone  back  into  that  infernal 
nonsense-land,  that  was  it!  It  was  like  Alice 
in  Wonderland,  things  were  pursuing  him, 
and  certainly  this  was  a  cruel  vision. 

But  as  he  lay  with  closed  eyes  he  could  hear 
distinctly  the  voices  of  people  on  the  piazza 
outside  his  window,  and  the  rattle  of  kitchen 
dishes,  and  the  calls  of  a  little  party  on  the 
croquet  lawn — "Now,  that's  my  wicket  !"- 
so  he  couldn't  be  quite  crazy. 

He  lifted  his  heavy  lids  again. 

"Do  you  mind,"  he  begged,  "just  explain- 
ing what  you  mean?    I  guess  I'm  dotty  still. 
72 


THE    REASON 

I  wonder  if  I  can  understand  what  you  mean 
about  the  Ribbon." 

"Why,  you  remember,"  she  leaned  over  him, 
speaking  softly,  "that  you  rode  Ladybird  at 
the  show  ?" 

"Yes,  I  remember  that!" 

"And  you  remember  that  you  shoved  her 
off  superbly — that  she  easily  took  the  Ribbon 
from  the  whole  class?  Why,  then,  just  as 
you  were  supposedly  riding  off,  instead  of  do- 
ing so  you  went  for  two  more  hurdles,  although 
my  husband  and  the  jury  called  out  to  you; 
and  at  the  last  the  poor  beast  refused — and 
that's  where  the  tragedy  occurred." 

"I  had  won  the  Ribbon?"  he  echoed,  hear- 
ing nothing  else. 

"Why,  yes!  Yes!  Everything  would  have 
been  all  right  if  you  had  only  stopped.  Didn't 
you  know  it?  Why  did  you  go  on?  We  all 
have  wondered." 

The  young  fellow  stared  rather  piteously  at 
her.  His  face — what  she  could  see  of  it — 
73 


FIRST    LOVE 

pale  with  unusual  pain,  had  matured,  and  his 
boyishness  for  the  moment  was  gone.  He 
looked  like  an  old  soldier  after  a  campaign,  and 
from  behind  the  snowy  bandages  his  eyes 
shone  like  deep  blue  stars. 

"Do  you  remember  now,  Mr.  Bennett?" 
To  herself  she  thought,  "I'm  going  to  make 
him  understand  it,  it's  just  as  well  that  he 
should."  And  she  repeated  gently,  "Do  you 
remember — can  you  tell  me  why  you  kept 
on  at  the  hurdles?" 

A  delicate  color  stole  into  his  cheek.  He 
said  weakly,  "I  seem  to  remember  now  that 
we  passed  the  goal  all  right  and  in  good  shape, 
then  I  couldn't  stop,  I  went  straight  on  with 
the  poor  little  mare.  Is  she  dead?  Don't 
mind,  I  can  stand  it.  Is  Ladybird  dead?  I'm 
sorry,"  he  said  simply,  "she  was  a  corker! 
Mr.  Bathurst  will  hate  me  all  right — I  should 
think  he  would!  She  must  have  been  worth 
a  pile  of  money.  She  was  the  best  little  beast 
I  ever  rode." 

74 


THE   REASON 

His  eyelids  fell,  he  could  have  cried  like 
a  girl,  there  seemed  to  him  something  so  un- 
necessary, so  wanton,  so  mean  in  what  he  had 
done. 

And  while  the  lady  was  quite  unprepared 
for  his  look  he  opened  his  eyes  on  her  as  she 
stood  there,  the  apron  folds  across  her  breast, 
her  hands  still  lying  on  the  coverlid.  He 
regarded  her  with  a  gravity  that  amazed  her. 

"The  reason  that  I  went  on  riding  like  that 
was  that  I  looked  up  suddenly  over  to  where 
the  fellows  said  the  trap  was — and  I  saw 
her." 


75 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  BRUTE 

FROM  the  roof,  over  which  the  leaves  of 
the  oaks,  after  turning  to  brittle  brown, 
were  beginning  to  fall,  to  the  piazza  at  whose 
steps  the  horses  were  brought  to  be  mounted, 
and  from  where  one  looked  off  to  the  curves 
and  folds — the  cups  and  dips  of  the  Valley 
— Bathurst  House,  the  whole  of  it,  was  a 
dwelling  of  enchantment  to  John  Bennett. 

He  had  been  a  guest  there  now  for  three 
weeks.  After  his  removal  from  the  Big  Tree 
Inn  they  took  him  there,  fixed  him  up  in  a  fine 
big  room  with  a  fine  big  view,  and  with  every 
goodness  and  kindness  around  him,  and  the 
morning  and  the  evening  of  it  were  the  first 
day.  The  whole  of  Bathurst  House  had  one 
significance  and  was  full  of  magic  to  the  cor- 
ners and  roof  line. 

76 


THE    BRUTE 

Bathurst  House  was  the  shell  that  held  its 
mistress.  At  any  time  John  might  see  her  pass 
through  the  rooms  in  some  one  of  her  frocks, 
whose  grace  and  goodly  sweep  and  perfume 
became  for  the  young  man  like  cerements, 
with  which,  as  it  were,  he  found  himself  all 
wrapped  round,  and  in  which  he  hid  his  face 
and  pressed  to  his  lips  in  his  dreams  at  night. 

He  might,  in  handing  her  an  object,  no 
more  important  than  a  tea-cup  or  a  book  or 
her  entirely  marvelous  handkerchief,  come 
nearer  to  the  perfume — be  more  shocked  by  it. 
He  might,  in  giving  her  a  trifling  thing,  touch 
her,  and  for  this  the  foot-ball  half-back,  the 
sport,  the  young  man  who  loved  riding  and 
hunting  and  outdoor,  lived  hour  by  hour,  with 
all  his  young  senses  stirring  like  birds  come  to 
maturity,  and  longing  for  the  one  supernal 
flight.  In  one  of  the  rooms,  whose  chairs,  fire- 
place, decorations,  pictures,  books,  and  even 
clocks  seemed  charmed  articles,  and  whose 
like  he  thought  he  never  would  see  again  in 
77 


FIRST   LOVE 

any  house— in  one  of  these  rooms  he  might 
speak  with  her  if  she  were  sufficiently  disen- 
gaged to  notice  him.  From  his  group  of  the 
young  people  he  might  watch  her  at  work  at 
her  tapestry,  for  she  embroidered.  He  might 
spring  up  to  get  her  a  stool  for  her  feet,  an 
extra  little  table  to  rest  her  frame  on,  he  might 
hand  her  a  book  if  she  were  reading,  and  then 
he  might  watch  her  read. 

In  one  of  the  rooms  whose  doors  gave  into 
the  big  hall  he  might  meet  her  dressed  for  her 
ride;  exult  to  see  her  so  dressed  in  her  close- 
fitting  habit,  severe  and  perfectly  chaste,  and 
yet  more  provoking  than  any  other  costume. 
He  might  hold  her  crop  as  she  put  on  her 
thick  gloves,  and  she  seemed  to  draw  the 
chamois  over  John's  heart  as  he  watched  her 
fingers  and  the  palms  of  her  hands  disappear. 
Although  not  yet  strong  enough  to  help  her 
mount,  he  might  follow  to  her  horse  and  curse 
some  other  man  who  held  her  foot  in  his  hand 
or  gave  her  his  shoulder,  and  stand  raging  at 
78 


THE    BRUTE 

the  sight  in  his  hot  young  heart.  She  would 
then  ride  away  into  the  yellow  haze  of  Indian 
summer  light,  and  a  suffocation  would  come 
into  John's  throat,  and  his  heart  would  ache, 
and  he  only  lived  thenceafter  until  from  some 
sheltering  window  he  would  see  her  ride 
home. 

In  the  drawing-room  much  later  in  the  even- 
ing he  would  see  her  again  in  her  unclad 
beauty,  in  the  freedom  the  dress  of  a  woman 
after  six  o'clock  permits,  and  Bennett  dreaded 
and  longed  for  these  visions  at  once. 

And  this  was  the  way  in  which  the  young 
man  fell  first  in  love.  This  was  the  way  the 
sportsman  and  athlete  saw  his  heart  open  to  a 
woman  nearly  old  enough  to  be  his  mother, 
and  beautiful  enough  to  have  charmed  him 
down  to  the  last  of  his  dim  old  days.  Like 
this  the  first  woman  came  to  him,  and  it  was 
nothing  but  the  old  story  over  again,  interest- 
ing because  it  was  first  love — because  it  was 
real.  His  heart  was  entirely  virgin  and  en- 
79 


FIRST    LOVE 

tirely  clean,  and  Virginia  Bathurst  wrote  her 
name  there. 

He  had  been  still  another  three  weeks  in  his 
room,  caged  up,  visited  by  his  chums,  visited 
by  Miss  Cynthia  Forsythe,  finally,  just  before 
he  came  down-stairs.  One  day  Mrs.  Bathurst 
and  she  came  in  to  sit  with  him  for  tea.  And 
John  had  quietly  looked  out  at  the  yellow 
shadow  of  the  tree  before  his  window  while 
Miss  Forsythe  read  aloud  and  Mrs.  Bathurst 
embroidered.  The  heads  of  both  women  were 
against  the  sunset,  and  the  light  found  Cyn- 
thia's blonde  hair  no  obstacle,  and  filtered 
through  its  gold,  whereas  Mrs.  Bathurst's  hair 
was  a  shade  in  which  the  sunlight  lost  itself, 
held  back,  disturbed,  and  stopped  short.  Her 
head  thus  stood  out  dark,  clearly  defined 
against  the  background  of  clear  gold.  She 
had  stopped  Cynthia's  reading  to  say  to  John, 
"The  light  dazzles  you!"  and  put  her  hand 
up  to  the  shade. 

"No,  no !"  he  had  stammered ;  "please  leave 
80 


THE    BRUTE 

it,  I  like  to  watch  you  sitting  in  the  light,  it 
makes  a  nice  picture." 

Cynthia  Forsythe  looked  up  gratefully  with 
a  blush,  and  it  had  been  her  eyes  that  John  met. 

From  then  on  the  girl's  voice  trembled  to 
the  end  of  the  page. 

After  the  two  women  had  left  the  invalid, 
he  lay  for  a  long  time  in  his  chair,  shutting 
his  eyes  to  hold  the  vision  of  Virginia.  He 
would  have  drawn  the  picture  on  his  brain 
could  he  have  done  so.  He  could  understand 
the  sailors  who  tattoo  images  on  their  very 
flesh,  he  wanted  to  keep  always  the  picture 
of  her  dark  head  against  the  glory  of  the  golden 
sunset. 

It  was  his  last  day  up-stairs.  The  next  he 
was  down,  still  an  invalid,  but  intact,  not- 
withstanding it  was  another  man  from  the  one 
they  had  carried  up  from  the  Big  Tree  Inn. 
He  had  gone  into  his  room  with  broken  ribs 
and  broken  bones ;  he  came  down  a  solid  victim 
of  a  more  serious  complication,  and  for  the 
81 


FIRST   LOVE 

malady  with  which  he  suffered  now  there  was 
no  cure  without  sin. 

"Virginia,  I  didn't  know  you  were  a  match- 
maker!" 

Nicholas  Pyrnne  and  her  husband  sat  by 
Mrs.  Bathurst's  side,  and  Mr.  Bathurst,  in 
evening  dress,  his  red  face  above  his  white 
collar  shining  like  an  inebriate  moon  in  the 
full,  answered  sarcastically : 

"Virginia's  so  happy  in  her  married  life, 
Pyrnne,  that  she  wants  to  fetch  everybody 
into  the  ring-a-round-a-rosy !" 

Peter  never  addressed  his  wife  without  a 
covert  insult  or  a  sneer,  or  some  broad  admira- 
tion which  she  felt  harder  to  bear  than  any 
other  form  of  torture.  After  flinging  in  her 
face  his  infidelities  for  years,  he  had  discovered 
that  his  wife  was  the  handsomest  and  most 
attractive  woman  he  knew ;  he  had  returned  to 
her  and  found  her  cold,  indifferent,  and  with 
nothing  for  him  but  indomitable  dislike. 

"You  say  you  forgive  me,  Virginia,"  he 
82 


THE   BRUTE 

often  flung  at  her.  "I  wonder  if  any  woman 
can  forgive  a  man  from  an  iceberg,  and  then 
freeze  his  soul  as  you  can." 

She  told  herself  that  she  had  done  all  she 
could.  She  thought  sincerely  that  she  had 
done  her  very  best.  She  tolerated  her  husband 
under  the  same  roof  and  in  her  presence;  as 
well  as  she  could  she  covered  her  dislike  and 
disgust  Divorce  she  dismissed;  she  was  a 
Roman  Catholic,  moreover,  and  in  Paris  dur- 
ing the  years  when  Bathurst's  open  scandals 
would  have  excited  her  to  the  point  of  separa- 
tion she  lived  her  own  life  freely,  without 
hesitation,  refreshed  and  stimulated  by  the 
flattery  her  beauty  commanded.  But  no  one 
had  touched  her  sentiments  even  vaguely  un- 
til these  last  days:  she  had  believed  herself 
immune.  Years  before  she  had  loved  her 
husband,  and  he  had  insulted  her. 

Nicholas  Pyrnne  loved  her  long  before  her 
marriage,  and  his  failure  to  win  her  had  spoiled 
his  life.  "After  you  threw  me  down,  Vir- 
83 


FIRST    LOVE 

ginia,"  he  had  been  used  to  tell  her,  "well,  I 
could  never  get  up  again."  And  he  accepted 
his  career  in  a  half-hearted  way,  only  counting 
for  important  those  times  when  he  should  see 
her,  and  because  she  forbade  him,  Pyrnne  did 
not  follow  her  wherever  she  went. 

"I  like  to  see  your  interest  in  marriage," 
Pyrnne  said  to  her  now.  "I  like  to  see  a 
woman  helping  the  good  cause  along.  But 
you  don't  find  Miss  Forsythe  as  pliable  as 
Miss  Cornwallis,  do  you,  Virginia?" 

"Cynthia's  a  silly  little  fool!"  returned 
Bathurst  politely,  "and  Jack's  far  too  good  for 
her.  I'll  tell  him  so  to-night  after  dinner." 

"I  don't  think  I'd  tell  him  anything  of  the 
sort,"  Pyrnne  said.  "He'll  put  you  in  your 
place  if  you  do.  Did  you  ever  let  your  father 
give  you  advice  about  your  girls?  I  fancy 
not" 

"I  wish  to  God  I  had  let  him!"  muttered 
Bathurst. 

"Jack  isn't  in  love  with  Miss  Forsythe," 
84 


THE   BRUTE 

Prynne  went  on  smoothly,  and  Mrs.  Bathurst 
interrupted : 

"Oh,  don't  you  think  so?" 

"Not  a  bit  in  love,"  Nicholas  repeated 
decidedly.  "Any  man  in  love  himself  can 
see  it."  He  made  no  secret  of  his  own  tender- 
ness for  Virginia,  and  Peter  Bathurst,  oddly 
enough,  had  no  jealousy  regarding  his  wife's 
old  friend,  to  whom  he  knew  Virginia  to  be 
indifferent.  He  took  a  sort  of  delight  in  his 
companionship,  and  they  had  been  friends  for 
years. 

"I  don't  care  whether  Jack  likes  Cynthia  or 
not,"  said  Bathurst  rudely;  "she'll  give  him 
the  go-by  if  he  asks  her  to  marry  him.  She's 
head-over-heels  in  love  with  that  bounder, 
John  Bennett,  and  she  doesn't  care  who  knows 
it,  either." 

Mrs.  Bathurst  had  long  since  learned  to  hold 

her  tongue.    It  was  part  of  her  cruel  strength 

that  her  husband  never  tortured  her  to  a  sharp 

reply  or  to  a  reproach.     Pyrnne  said  further: 

85 


FIRST    LOVE 

"If  what  you  tell  me  is  true,  old  man,  I'm 
going  to  watch  the  game." 

"These  girls  are  as  rusee  as  a  woman  of 
thirty,  my  dear  man,"  said  Bathurst. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  rose  and  left  them  here. 

There  was  a  group  out  in  the  hall  around  the 
piano;  at  it  Donald  Dashwood,  an  inveterate 
hunter  and  a  gay  good  liver,  was  sitting  play- 
ing and  singing  a  hunting  song. 

As  Mrs.  Bathurst  went  out  Peter  said : 

"They're  a  silly,  giggling  lot,  and  as  green 
as  grass,  all  of  them." 

"Well,"  said  Pyrnne  good-humoredly,  "I 
must  say  I  think  Miss  Forsythe's  rather  more 
like  a  bouquet ;  she's  the  prettiest  young  woman 
of  the  season." 

"She  hasn't  the  sense  to  make  up  to  my  son," 
grunted  Peter,  Senior;  "she  prefers  that  red- 
headed foot-ball  player,  who  would  be  better 
with  a  foot-ball  between  his  legs  than  a  horse. 
It  makes  me  sick  whenever  I  think  of  that 
mare,  Pyrnne." 

86 


THE    BRUTE 

"I  don't  wonder,"  responded  the  other  man. 
"But  you  can't  say  that  it  didn't  make  him 
sick,  too." 

"I  wish  she  had  kicked  a  little  harder,  that's 
all,"  said  Bathurst. 

The  two  men  passed  out  toward  the  hallway. 

"I've  been  decent  to  him" — Bathurst  low- 
ered his  voice — "because  he's  in  my  house, 
but  I  loved  Ladybird,  and  there  are  times  when 
I  could  tell  him  my  mind." 

Nicholas  nodded  absently.  "Dashwood's 
got  a  good  voice,  hasn't  he?" 

"You're  right,"  the  host  cried.  "He's 
going  to  have  a  ripping  good  time  now,  you 
can  believe;  for  they  say  his  divorce  will  be 
granted  before  the  week  is  out.  Do  you  want 
to  lose  a  little  money,  Nick?"  his  host  con- 
tinued, holding  back  Pyrnne  by  the  arm. 

"Well,  I'd  just  as  soon  make  fifty  dollars 
off  you,"  said  Pyrnne,  "if  that's  what  you  want 
me  to  say." 

"I  bet  you  fifty  dollars,"  said  Bathurst,  "that 
87 


FIRST   LOVE 

I  kiss  that  girl  before  to-morrow  morning,  and 
that  she  lets  me." 

Pyrnne  laughed.  "You're  a  bit  stronger 
than  she  is.  I  don't  think  anything  but  main 
force  would  do  it." 

"I  know  the  breed,"  said  the  other  slowly. 
"These  young  twentieth-century  girls  are  all 
alike.  You  can  kiss  any  one  of  them  fast 
enough." 

"Don't  be  a  brute,  Bathurst,"  said  Nicholas 
tartly. 

"Will  you  bet?" 

"No,"  said  Nicholas  slowly,  "I  will  not ;  and 
you'd  better  not  let  that  red-headed  foot-ball 
player  see  you  try," 

Bathurst  laughed  delightedly.  "That's  all 
right,"  he  said,  "that  dare  of  yours  is  as  good 
as  a  bet.  I  don't  know  but  I  like  it  better. 
You  spur  me  on,  old  man." 

"All  right,"  said  Nicholas  impatiently,  try- 
ing to  get  away  from  him;  and  when  he  was 
alone  he  said,  "Common  beast!  Poor  Vir- 
88 


THE    BRUTE 

ginia !  I  couldn't  have  turned  out  worse  than 
that.  She'd  better  have  taken  me  twenty  years 
ago." 


89 


CHAPTER  IX 

A  DINNER 

CYNTHIA  FORSYTHE,  so  far  from  be- 
ing, as  Bathurst  said,  rusee  and  fast, 
didn't  know  evil  when  she  saw  its  face.  Pure- 
spirited,  of  good  faith,  she  looked  on  the  world 
as  a  happy  festival,  to  which,  dressed  in  all  her 
youth  and  beauty,  she  was  invited  to  partake. 
Mrs.  Bathurst  had  judged  her  thus  when  for  a 
few  days  she  had  seen  her  in  Washington, 
and  she  had  selected  her  for  her  oldest  step- 
son. But  Miss  Forsythe  baffled  any  match- 
making; she  was  a  cool  little  flirt,  and  if  she 
had  much  heart  behind  her  graceful  exterior, 
she  didn't  tell  for  whom  it  beat. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  of  late  had  been  absorbed  in 

other  things  than  Cynthia's  love-affairs.     She 

had  been  nursing  John  Bennett  back  to  life. 

The  other  young  members  of  the  house-party, 

90 


A    DINNER 

Miss  Cornwallis,  without  any  one's  aid  or  any 
one  to  interest  themselves  in  her  affairs,  had 
carried  Peter  Bathurst,  Junior,  by  storm.  The 
two  were  engaged,  and  Cynthia  was  stopping 
on  with  her  friend,  and  no  longer  clung  to 
Mrs.  Bathurst.  She  kept  to  herself,  and  as 
soon  as  John  Bennett  came  down-stairs  she 
had  stopped  flirting  with  Jack ;  she  was  ready 
to  be  made  love  to,  and  the  right  man  didn't 
take  the  hint.  She  sat  on  this  night  at  dinner 
next  her  host,  of  whom  she  was  a  little  afraid. 

When  she  had  come  to  think  of  Virginia 
Bathurst  at  all,  she  pitied  her.  Mr.  Pyrnne, 
Cynthia  thought,  pitied  her  as  well.  How  he 
looks  at  her;  he  understands  everything,  of 
course!  What  a  shame  she  didn't  marry  him 
instead  of  her  horrid  husband! 

Virginia  wore  a  dark  dress,  a  little  band  of 
diamonds  in  her  hair,  a  little  line  of  them 
round  her  throat,  a  cluster  at  her  breast,  and 
her  arms  and  hands  lay  along  the  dead  white 
dinner-cloth  like  carved  ivory,  but  of  a  warmer 


FIRST    LOVE 

texture,  and  under  the  fine  flesh  the  life  ran 
warm. 

John  Bennett  and  Mr.  Pyrnne  sat  either  side 
of  her.  Pyrnne  talked  to  her  without  interrup- 
tion, she  answering  him  wittily,  with  the  famil- 
iarity of  old  acquaintance,  and  the  young  col- 
legian watched  and  listened,  not  venturing  to 
take  too  active  a  part.  All  down  the  table 
center  spread  the  flowers,  their  fresh  and  fra- 
grant beauty,  the  scent  of  lilies  and  violets, 
the  odor  of  mignonette  and  heliotrope  hung 
light  on  the  air.  Several  of  the  men  were  in 
pink  coats,  Mr.  Dashwood,  as  well  as  the  host 
— and  Peter  Bathurst  never  looked  better  than 
in  his  hunting  clothes,  something  like  an  Eng- 
lish squire,  and  on  this  occasion  his  face  was 
less  red,  and  his  position  of  host  became  him. 

"Dashwood,"  he  said,  "when  are  you  going 
to  get  your  divorce?" 

"Got  it  in  my  pocket,"  replied  that  gentle- 
man gaily.  "You  can  drink  to  its  health  if  you 
like." 

92 


A   DINNER 

"My  wife  will  congratulate  you,"  said  her 
husband,  looking  down  the  table  at  her. 
"You're  a  lucky  dog,  old  man." 

"Oh,  I  don't  know  about  that,"  Dashwood 
said  gallantly.  "I'm  inclined  to  think  Mrs. 
Dashwood  is  the  lucky  one.  I'm  no  good,  any- 
how." 

Cynthia  For sy the  looked  down  the  table — 
past  her  best  friend  and  her  lover,  past  Jack, 
who  was  indifferently  eating  salted  almonds, 
past  Pyrnne  to  the  hostess,  and  then  at  Mrs. 
Bathurst's  left.  The  young  man,  the  youngest 
at  the  table,  sat  with  his  sleek  head  a  little  bent, 
looking  at  nothing  in  especial.  He  was  listen- 
ing to  what  his  hostess  said  with  a  smile  on 
his  clear  young  face. 

"Mrs.  Bathurst,  you  saw  Nell  to-day,  didn't 
you,  over  at  the  Country  Club,  with  the  kids  ?" 
Nell  was  Mrs.  Dashwood. 

Yes,  Mrs.  Bathurst  had  seen  her. 

"Pining  away  ?"  asked  the  divorced  husband, 
drinking  as  he  waited  to  be  answered. 
93 


FIRST   LOVE 

"No,"  returned  the  hostess  slowly,  "not 
yet." 

"Ripping  little  kiddies!"  said  the  father. 
"If  I  am  to  blame  for  them!  They're  not 
pining  either,  Virginia?" 

"No,"  she  laughed,  "they  looked  very  well 
indeed." 

"Splendid!"  exclaimed  the  father,  putting 
his  glass  down.  "I  suppose  if  I  marry  again, 
and  if  Nell  marries  again,  why,  the  other  kids 
will  be  kind  of  first  cousins  all  round,  won't 
they?  Nice  mess,  isn't  it?"  He  grinned. 

His  face  was  brilliant,  with  sun  and  air, 
like  the  cheeks  of  the  inveterate  hunter.  His 
hand  beneath  his  cuff  was  red  and  tanned, 
the  cloth  was  scarcely  brighter. 

"You'd  better  be  glad  you're  a  Catholic," 
he  said  to  his  host.  "When  I  marry  again  it's 
going  to  be  the  Pope's  daughter!" 

Peter  laughed.  "Well,  she'd  be  sure  to  get 
a  dispensation.  You'd  better  try  somebody 
more  obscure." 

94 


A    DINNER 

The  Dashwood  affair  was  a  household  word 
through  the  country.  Husband  and  wife  were 
equally  popular,  and  each  had  his  own  friends 
and  champions. 

"Come,"  said  Bathurst,  "don't  be  discour- 
aging. You  and  I  are  the  only  old  married 
men  here,  you  know,  and  we  don't  want  these 
young  people  to  think  the  world's  made  up  of 
divorce  courts  and  quarrelsome  husbands  and 
wives." 

And  here  Pyrnne  broke  in: 

"How  many  of  you  are  going  to  the  meet 
to-morrow  ?" 

John  Bennett,  lifting  up  his  head,  said: 

"I  am,  for  one,"  and  stopped  like  a  sensi- 
tive horse,  for  fear  of  the  blow  his  host  might 
deal  him.  But  Bathurst  was  otherwise  en- 
gaged, and  did  not  hear  Pyrnne's  question. 

"Are  you  really  going?  Do  you  feel  up  to 
it  yet?" 

"Dashwood  has  loaned  me  his  horse,"  said 
Bennett,  "and  I  hope  I  won't  break  his  legs." 

95 


FIRST   LOVE 

"I  don't  think  you  will,"  said  Mrs.  Bathurst 
quietly,  "for  I  don't  believe  you'll  ride  to  hunt. 
Are  you  quite  crazy,  John?" 

A  sudden  exultation  that  she  had  forbidden 
him,  that  she  had  cared  to  forbid  him,  was  fol- 
lowed by  anger  because  she  spoke  to  him  as 
though  he  were  a  boy.  A  spirit  of  contradic- 
tion that  often  rises  in  the  early  stages  of 
love,  and  a  desire  that  her  pleading  should  be 
further  pushed,  made  John  say: 

"But  I've  got  to  make  a  move  sometime, 
I  guess.  I'm  all  right,  and  Dashwood's  horse 
is  over  from  the  farm  for  me." 

Mrs.  Bathurst,  looking  at  him  as  she  might 
at  Jack  or  Peter,  said : 

"Oh,  you  mustn't  even  think  of  it,  you're 
certainly  not  up  to  it." 

John  felt  Pyrnne's  eyes  on  him  in  a  fatherly 
fashion,  and  he  raged.  He  hated  Nicholas 
Pyrnne  with  his  cool  assurance,  his  infernal 
cheek,  as  the  young  man  called  it. 

"Are  you  riding?"  he  asked  shortly. 
96 


A   DINNER 

"I  should  say  I  was!"  returned  the  con- 
gressman. "I  didn't  come  up  here  in  the 
Valley  to  miss  a  hunt." 

"Are  you?"  John's  blue  eyes,  which  avoided 
Mrs.  Bathurst  as  a  rule,  met  the  sparkle  of 
those  dark  ones  now,  met  the  look  of  amuse- 
ment and  kindness. 

"Why,  of  course,"  she  said;  "I  have  been 
longing  for  the  hunt.  I  think  every  one  is 
riding  but  you." 

A  stupid,  silly  fury  sprang  up  in  him,  and  if 
a  fiery  horse  with  death  in  his  nostrils  had 
appeared,  he  would  have  thrown  himself  on  the 
beast  gladly,  and  ridden  to  perdition  just  to 
prove  his  obstinacy.  He  would  show  how 
strong  he  was. 

"Dashwood,"  he  cried  excitedly  across  the 
table,  "it's  all  right,  isn't  it,  about  that  horse  of 
yours?" 

"Certainly.  He's  waiting  for  you  to  break 
his  legs,  my  dear  chap.  He'll  be  cooling  down 
his  heels  at  the  proper  time  to-morrow.  Just 
97 


FIRST   LOVE 

telephone  down  to-night  to  the  stables  and 
speak  to  the  head  groom." 

"All  right,"  said  Bennett  easily,  "thanks 
a  thousand  times,  old  man." 

The  lady  glanced  at  him,  surprised,  then 
answered  Nicholas  Pyrnne's  remark,  whatever 
it  may  have  been,  and  turned  her  face  from 
her  obstreperous  invalid.  She  paled  slightly, 
and  Bennett  had  the  satisfaction  of  knowing 
that  he  had  been  rude  and  a  boor,  ungrateful, 
impossible,  and  that  he  had  displeased  her.  His 
folly  made  his  heart  sore,  but  as  he  pushed  his 
chair  £  little  back  from  the  table  he  felt  more 
like  a  man. 

Bathurst  had  got  up  and  gone  out  of  the 
room  to  the  telephone,  and  had  not  heard  the 
conversation,  so  he  had  no  chance  to  throw  a 
barbed  dart  at  poor  Bennett  regarding  his 
ride. 

"I  say,  Cynthia!"  he  called  back  into  the 
room.  "Come  here  a  second,  will  you?  Some- 
body's got  you  on  the  telephone.  Washing- 
98 


A   DINNER 

ton  wants  you."  And  Cynthia  left  precipi- 
tately, her  first  thought  being  incontinently, 
"Oh,  I  hope  mother  isn't  going  to  tell  me  to 
come  home!" 

Miss  Forsythe  was  so  little  rusee  and  so 
perfectly  sweet  and  of  good  faith  that  she 
ran  out  of  the  dining-room  in  answer  to  her 
Washington  call,  and  into  the  telephone  booth, 
whose  door  Peter  Bathurst,  Senior,  held  open 
for  her,  with  but  one  thought  in  her  mind, 
"Oh,  dear,  I  hope  they  are  not  sending  for 
me  to  go  home!"  And  when  a  few  minutes 
later  she  returned  to  the  dining-room  she 
was  very  much  disturbed,  breathing  rather 
fast,  and  it  would  have  been  plain  for  any  one 
to  see,  who  looked  twice  at  her,  that  she  had 
had  some  kind  of  shock. 

Two  of  the  guests  looked  twice  at  her — 
Pyrnne  and  Jack  Bathurst.  No  one  else. 

"Bad  news?"  Jack  asked.     "What's  up?" 

"No,"  Cynthia  stammered,  "nothing  very 
bad." 

99 


FIRST   LOVE 

And  Grace  Cornwallis,  who  lived  in  one  long 
dream  of  bliss,  came  out  of  her  Arcadia  long 
enough  to  remark  to  her  friend : 

"Why,  Cynthia,  is  your  mother  ill?" 

And  here  Miss  Forsythe  recovered  her  com- 
posure and  laughed,  pulling  her  wits  together. 

"Why,  nobody's  ill.  It's  nothing  but  a 
stupid  telephone  mistake.  It  was  Buffalo 
wanting  to  talk  to  the  Washingtons  over  the 
hill." 

But  Cynthia  joined  Miss  Cornwallis,  and 
Peter,  Junior,  and  the  girls  went  out  together, 
arm-in-arm,  from  the  dining-room.  Pyrnne 
looked  for  Bathurst,  who  did  not  appear,  and 
then  looked  at  the  girl  in  an  amused  and  rather 
conscience-stricken  fashion.  Cynthia,  in  a  big 
chair  in  the  corner  of  the  room,  saw  John 
Bennett  cross  over  to  her.  The  occurrence  was 
rare  and  she  waited  with  delight,  the  discom- 
fort of  the  telephone  experience  for  the 
moment  overshadowed. 

John  was  very  tall,  he  carried  his  inches 
100 


A    DINNER 

well,  his  shoulders  were  like  a  young  Titan's  ;- 
his  bones  had  knit  well,  his  flesh  had  returned 
to  him,  his  simple  life  and  habits,  his  good 
spirits,  and  good  temper  had  pulled  him  back 
rapidly. 

Cynthia  didn't  know  that  he  was  annoyed 
and  miserable,  and  calling  himself  a  rude  ass. 
He  came  and  sat  down  by  her  side. 

"I  can't  tell  Grace,"  she  thought,  "she's 
too  much  in  love  with  Peter,  and  it  would  make 
her  fearfully  angry.  I  can't  tell  Mrs.  Bathurst, 
least  of  all.  I  can't  tell  Pyrnne,  he'd  laugh  at 
me  most  likely,  and  then  he's  Mr.  Bathurst's 
friend.  I  can't  go  home  yet,  I  don't  want  to 
go  home.  I  don't  want  to  go!" 

"How  about  getting  up  at  five  o'clock  to- 
morrow morning,  Miss  Forsythe?"  Bennett 
asked  her. 

"Oh,  I'm  quite  up  to  it,"  she  replied.  "But 
really  and  truly,  Mr.  Bennett,  you  oughtn't 
to  ride  yet,  you  know." 

"Oh,  bosh!"  said  John.     "Don't  you  join 
101 


FIRST   LOVE 

in  and  make  me  out  a  mollycoddle.  I  thought 
you  were  a  sport." 

"I'm  not,"  she  said  definitely,  "I'm  not  a 
bit  of  a  sport.  I  begin  to  think  I  must  be  a 
coward  and  a  silly  little  fool." 

John  bent  his  blue  eyes  on  her  in  surprise. 
The  type  of  the  girl  he  had  made  love  to  all 
his  youth  was  before  him  in  Cynthia  Forsythe. 
If  Milly  Haven  had  gone  on  being  and  existing 
in  his  environment  she  would  have  been  like 
this,  slender,  well-groomed,  charming,  fine. 

Cynthia's  eyes  were  softer  than  Milly 
Haven's,  and  kinder.  She  looked  like  a  bou- 
quet of  jasmine  all  in  white  and  very  sweet, 
and  there  was  something  in  her  which  seemed 
to  question  the  young  man  as  she  looked  up 
at  him  from  the  depths  of  her  chair.  He 
hadn't  observed  her  much  before.  He  knew 
that  she  was  rich,  pretty,  and  that  Jack  would 
please  his  family  if  he  married  her.  He  knew 
that  Jack  teased  him  and  said  that  Cynthia 
was  "mad  about  John  Bennett."  Girls  had 
102 


A   DINNER 

been  crazy  about  him  ever  since  he  had  shone 
out  at  a  party  in  Boston,  his  red  head  above 
his  first  stiff  shirt,  and  his  first  black  coat ;  and 
he  had  licked  a  fellow  that  night,  at  his  first 
ball.  Because  Cynthia  Forsythe's  eyes  were 
something  like  Milly  Haven's  John  recalled 
that  escapade. 

"Do  you  know,"  he  said  abruptly  with  a 
little  laugh,  "I  have  just  thought  of  something 
rather  funny."  He  had  been  too  long  out  of 
the  sentimental  game,  he  said  to  himself.  Too 
long  out  of  the  way  of  making  pretty  speeches. 
He  thought  he  would  take  a  turn  now,  and  he 
leaned  over  Cynthia. 

"Do  you  know,"  he  repeated,  "that  I  lambed 
a  -fellow  half  to  bits  for  a  girl  who  had  eyes 
like  yours?" 

But  he  had  spoken  far  better  and  more  to  the 
point  than  he  could  have  imagined  now. 

"Did  you  really  ?"  Miss  Forsythe  exclaimed. 
She  sat  up  from  her  languid  position.  "Did 
you?" 

103 


FIRST   LOVE 

John  nodded  and  laughed.  He  was  thinking 
of  the  fight,  and  how  the  boy  had  met  his 
blows. 

"I  don't  know  why  I  should  remember  it 
especially,"  he  said;  "one  fight's  about  like 
another,  only,  you  see,  your  eyes  made  me 
think  of  it,  I  suppose." 

"What  did  the  boy  do?"  Miss  Forsythe 
asked. 

"He  didn't  do  it,"  John  said.  He  put  his 
hands  in  his  pockets  and  leaned  back  in  his 
chair.  "That  was  the  point." 

"What  did  he  try  to  do?" 

"He  tried  to  kiss  the  girl  who  gave  the  party, 
of  course,"  said  John,  "behind  the  door,  and 
she  got  out  and  I  got  in.  That's  all.  Very 
easy  to  do.  It  wasn't  what  you'd  call  party 
manners  by  a  good  deal,  and  the  girl's  mother 
sent  us  both  home  in  a  cab!" 

"I  hope,"  said  Miss  Forsythe  with  animos- 
ity, "that  you  pounded  him  well." 

"I  licked  him  the  best  I  could,"  said  John 
104 


A   DINNER 

with  satisfaction.  "And  he  was  my  chum  as 
well,  which  went  against  the  grain." 

"I  wish,"  said  Cynthia  abruptly,  "that  you'd 
do  a  little  licking  for  me." 

John  raised  his  eyebrows. 

"Really?"  he  said.     "Who?" 

The  words  once  out  of  Miss  Forsythe's 
mouth,  she  regretted  them.  She  grew  cold; 
she  had  gone  on  as  girls  do  when  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  the  man  they  like.  She  looked  pinched 
and  rather  frightened,  and  as  John  looked  at 
her  the  bright  attraction  she  had  for  the 
moment  possessed  faded. 

"Not  Jack  ?"  he  asked.  "Not  another  chum, 
eh?" 

He  looked  around  the  room. 

Peter  and  his  fiancee  were  already  in  some 
friendly  deserted  room  across  the  hall.  Mrs. 
Bathurst  was  playing  solitaire  on  a  little  table 
before  the  fire.  Her  profile  was  toward  them. 
One  by  one  she  laid  the  cards  before  her  in 
their  sequence.  Nicholas  Pyrnne,  Dashwood, 
105 


FIRST   LOVE 

and  the  host  smoked  before  the  fire.  John's 
eyes  caught  the  flash  of  her  hand  as  <she> 
shuffled  her  cards. 

"Whom  shall  I  lick?"  he  repeated  absent- 
mindedly. 

"Not  Jack,"  the  girl  whispered  timorously, 
"and  not  Peter,  of  course,  and  not  Mr. 
Pyrnne— " 

"By  George!"  said  John  sympathetically, 
coming  back  to  her.  "What,  he!  that  old 
soak,  the  old  bully?"  He  stared  at  her.  "Do 
you  mean  to  say — " 

Cynthia,  in  that  moment,  as  his  warm  young 
voice  took  her  part,  went  over  to  John  Bennett 
with  all  the  rest  of  her  that  had  not  gone 
before.  What  a  big,  splendid  champion  he 
would  be!  What  a  man  he  seemed!  Carried 
away  by  his  sympathy  she  murmured : 

"Oh,  ever  since  I  came  he's  been  too  horrid. 

I  knew  he  was  that  kind.     Mother  warned 

me,  and  I  have  kept  away.     I  haven't  told 

Grace  or  any  one,  but  to-night  when  he  called 

1 06 


A    DINNER 

me  out  to  the  telephone,  of  course  there  wasn't 
any  message." 

"I  see,"  said  John  encouragingly.  "I  see, 
the  old  brute !  He  tried  to  kiss  you  ?" 

"Yes,"  she  answered,  "and  I  slapped  his 
face  so  that  my  hand  stung." 

"Good !"  said  John.    "I'm  glad  of  that." 

Oh,  yes,  he  knew  what  a  brute  Bathurst 
was.  But  the  host,  for  some  reason  or  other 
best  explained  by  his  peculiar  temperament, 
had  not  vented  his  spleen  on  John,  even 
though  the  boy  had  spoiled  his  horse.  On 
the  contrary,  he  had  been  fairly  decent  to 
him,  and  with  the  exception  of  one  or  two 
cutting  remarks  he  had  let  John  alone.  But  as 
he  sat  beside  the  young  girl  who  had  confided 
in  him,  his  sympathy  was  pouring  forth,  not  to 
her,  but  to  the  other  woman  before  her  cards. 
One  by  one  Airs.  Bathurst  laid  the  little  bits  of 
pasteboard  down.  Her  rings  sparkled;  the 
gems  on  her  dress  sparkled;  the  line  of  dia- 
monds in  her  hair  sparkled  as  well.  She  was  a 
107 


FIRST   LOVE 

brilliant  figure  in  the  firelight  that  drew  its  red 
kerchief  along  her  bare  arm.  The  blood  which 
at  any  long  looking  on  her  stung  John's  veins 
rose  now. 

"I'd  like  to  break  his  neck,"  he  said  brutally, 
and  he  clenched  his  hands. 

But  Miss  Forsythe  had  experienced  the  re- 
lief which  her  confidence  brought,  and  she  was 
less  exaggerated  in  her  belligerent  demands  for 
redress. 

"Isn't  it  too  disgusting?"  she  said,  "too  dis- 
gusting; but  of  course  one  can't  do  much  about 
it." 

"You  see,"  said  Bennett,  "after  all,  we  are 
his  guests.  I  am  particularly.  I've  been  looked 
after  like  one  of  the  family.  I'm  heavily  in 
his  debt." 

"Oh,  I  don't  want  you  to  whip  him  behind 
his  own  door,  Mr.  Bennett.  I  only  wanted  to 
tell  some  one,  and  I  told  you." 

"I'm  glad  you  did,"  he  said  simply.  "Bath- 
urst  must  have  been  drunk,  of  course.  But 
1 08 


A   DINNER 

he's  a  beastly  cad.  If  he  bothers  you  any  more 
let  me  know." 

John  couldn't  tell  why  he  offered  this  sud- 
den championship,  which  he  would  certainly 
find  it  difficult  to  live  up  to  in  a  man's  own 
house,  that  is,  unless  he  was  to  leave  that 
house  for  ever. 

Miss  Forsythe  said  rather  foolishly,  "Oh, 
of  course,  if  he  gets  too  bad  I  can  go!" 

"Yes,"  said  John,  with  too  cruel  indiffer- 
ence. "Of  course."  For  just  then  Mrs.  Bath- 
urst  finished  her  Patience  and  looked  up  tri- 
umphantly. 

"I  made  it,  Nick!"  she  called.  "Twice 
running." 

"First-rate!  Shall  we  gamble  on  it?  Five 
dollars  for  the  first  two  made." 

"If  you  like!  Only  I  forget  where  I  put 
the  other  Patience  cards.  Oh,  I  remember, 
the  drawer  in  my  dressing-table!" 

Bennett  sprang  up,  and  without  a  word  to 
the  girl  whose  side  he  left,  "Let  me  get  them !" 
109 


FIRST   LOVE 

he  offered,  and  went  two  steps  at  a  time  up 
the  stairs  on  her  errand  at  the  first  sound  of 
her  voice. 

Once  or  twice  with  Jack  or  Peter,  Junior, 
John  had  passed  the  threshold  of  the  room 
toward  which  he  made  his  way.  He  had  seen 
the  interior  the  day  before,  when,  with  her 
husband,  he  had  gone  into  the  boudoir  for  a 
cup  of  tea.  But  he  wanted  to  go  to  that  room 
alone,  and  he  went  toward  it  now  with  an 
eagerness  that  was  almost  a  thirst.  The  door 
was  open,  but  there  was  no  light.  On  the 
couch  her  dressing-gown  was  thrown,  her 
slippers  were  beside  it  on  the  floor.  There 
was  a  book  with  a  paper-cutter  between  the 
leaves,  and  on  the  left  the  piece  of  furniture 
in  whose  drawer  the  cards  had  been  placed. 

Bennett  stood  a  second  just  over  the  door- 
sill,  and  drew  a  long  breath.  The  same 
fragrance  he  connected  with  her  hung  on  the 
air  of  the  room.  A  little  fire  burned  in  the 
grate,  and  this  was  the  only  light ;  he  saw  the 
no 


A    DINNER 

objects  in  its  flickering  radiance.  No  one 
had  come  up-stairs,  the  servants  were  at  din- 
ner, and  the  bedrooms  deserted,  yet  voices 
made  a  confusion  in  his  ears  like  the  sea. 

Through  the  open  door  he  looked  into  the 
bedroom.  It  was  very  white  and  great  and 
vast,  it  seemed  like  a  world ;  the  bed  was  open. 
The  aspect  of  the  place,  the  home  it  was  for 
her,  the  fact  that  it  sheltered  her  for  many 
hours  and  for  the  most  intimate  hours — the 
place  it  was  overcame  the  boy  as  if  it  had 
been  filled  with  a  sudden  light  that  smote  his 
eyes.  Leaning  against  the  door  frame  he 
held  the  soft,  silken  curtains  that  hung  between 
in  his  hands.  The  room,  white  and  sweet, 
unfolded  to  him  like  a  lily;  it  enveloped  him, 
he  felt  his  heart  swell  and  his  limbs  grow  weak. 
Something  like  a  cry  came  from  his  lips,  and 
the  sweat  rose  on  his  brow.  He  brushed  his 
hand  across  his  forehead  and  eyes.  Shivering 
with  emotion,  then  shaking  like  a  man  who 
has  seen  a  ghost,  he  went  from  the  room  and 
in 


FIRST    LOVE 

down-stairs.     Half-way  down  he  remembered 
the  cards.     "What  an  ass  I  am!" 

He  started  back  again. 

But  Mrs.  Bathurst's  voice  called  him  from 
the  hall,  "What's  the  matter?  Can't  you  find 
them?  Why,  you  look  as  though  you'd  seen 
a  ghost !" 

Bennett  put  a  good  face  on  it ;  the  sight  of 
her  brought  him  to  reason.  He  tried  to  laugh. 

"And  you  talk  of  riding  to-morrow!"  she 
said  reproachfully. 

They  stood  facing  on  the  landing,  she  in 
her  dark  glistening  dress  and  her  proud  beauty. 

"She  thinks  of  me  as  though  I  were  her 
son,"  he  thought,  seeing  her  interest  and  her 
solicitude. 

"I'll  make  you  a  cocktail,"  she  said,  and 
took  his  arm  and  led  him  down  the  stairs,  "and 
afterward  you  must  go  to  bed.  You've  only 
been  about  for  a  week,  and  you  talk  of  hunt- 
ing to-morrow.  Why,  you're  clearly  crazy!" 

"Yes,"  said  Bennett,  "I  guess  I  am." 
112 


CHAPTER  X 

AN  INTERVIEW 

BENNETT  found  himself  in  the  big  fine 
room  where  he  had  convalesced  and 
where  Mrs.  Peter  Bathurst  had  tended  him. 
He  threw  himself  on  his  bed  in  his  shirt 
sleeves,  and  drew  his  reading  lamp  down  to 
his  side. 

He  had  come  up  sturdily  and  simply,  and 
he  was  a  strong,  live,  natural  human  being, 
scarcely  out  of  his  boyhood  and  yet  already  a 
man.  He  knew  what  his  pulsations  and  his 
heart-beats  meant,  what  his  desires  meant.  He 
knew  that  in  his  short  history  he  had  never 
lived  until  now ;  he  knew  that  he  was  a  traitor 
under  his  host's  roof,  and  that  the  pain  he 
felt  was  far  and  away  greater  than  any  happi- 
ness it  gave  him  to  be  in  the  presence  of  Peter 
Bathurst's  wife. 


FIRST    LOVE 

What  would  she  say  if  she  knew?  He  had 
asked  his  naive  heart  this  question  scores  of 
times.  She  would  more  than  likely  laugh  at 
him,  for  her  humor  was  very  keen.  She  would 
probably  berate  him  kindly,  for  she  didn't  hesi- 
tate to  speak  her  mind  about  his  merits,  and  to- 
night she  had  sent  him  off  to  bed  like  a  boy. 
To  her  he  was  a  boy,  nothing  more.  A  little 
bigger  than  the  youngster  to  whom  she  had 
given  the  gun,  the  friend  of  her  stepsons,  a 
fellow  just  out  of  college,  just  facing  life — 
callow,  inexperienced,  and  scarcely  to  be  taken 
into  account.  John  acknowledged  that  he  was 
all  this,  and  he  was  glad  he  had  a  whole  bunch 
of  things  to  learn.  What  man  of  twenty- 
four  hasn't  ?  Couldn't  he  learn  as  well  as  the 
next  man?  Couldn't  he  cut  out  his  life  as 
well  as  that  round-faced  congressman?  A 
dozen  careers  were  open  to  a  man  who  had  a 
little  money  to  start  in  with.  She  had  hinted 
^  that  a  political  life,  a  diplomatic  life  was  a 
good  thing  to  consider.  John  wondered  if  she 
114 


AN    INTERVIEW 

had  thought  of  him  and  his  future  when  she 
made  the  few  remarks  he  remembered  about 
a  diplomatic  career.  She  didn't  like  doctors, 
and  as  soon  as  he  found  this  out  all  idea  of 
taking  up  medicine  as  a  profession  was  put 
out  of  his  mind,  thus  breaking  to  bits  a  fa- 
vorite scheme  of  Doctor  Brainard's.  Well, 
would  she  follow  his  career  and  his  life,  what- 
ever it  might  be,  with  interest  ?  Perhaps,  after 
she  had  done  thinking  about  Peter  and  Jack, 
she  would  think  sometimes  of  how  John  Ben- 
nett was  getting  along,  the  third  of  the  college 
boys,  that  was  the  only  position  he  could  hope 
to  take. 

"Damn!"  he  muttered,  and  with  the  word 
cast  his  beautiful  youth  down.  What  did  one 
want  with  youth,  anyhow?  It  only  served  as 
stepping-stones  to  riper  age ;  it  was  a  footstool 
under  his  feet  which  he  would  be  glad  to  kick 
at  and  be  forty  in  a  twinkling.  But  this  phase 
passed,  the  very  buoyancy,  the  elasticity  of  his 
youth  sprang  back  to  place  and  lifted  him  with 


FIRST   LOVE 

its  green,  vigorous  swing.  It  was  bully,  after 
all,  to  be  young!  He  could  now  cut  out  his 
whole  life  in  a  way  she  would  approve.  Sup- 
pose he  had  already  planned  some  beastly  line 
of  life  in  a  walk  she  disapproved.  Suppose 
he  had  started  his  fortunes,  or  was  irrevocably 
about  to  do  so,  in  some  part  of  the  country 
where  he  could  never  see  her  again  ? 

He  determined  in  a  flash  to  look  up  what- 
ever business  ventures  Syracuse  had  to  offer, 
to  set  himself  to  work  there,  and  to  make  his 
way  under  her  very  eyes.  He  would  become 
rich  and  important,  every  one  in  town  would 
talk  of  him,  and  if  he  were  always  near  he 
could  watch  over  her  and  protect  her.  John 
liked  the  word,  and  repeated  it,  thinking  of 
the  brute  her  husband  was. 

"Poor  girl !"  he  said  timidly,  scarcely  daring 
to  form  the  words  in  his  mind,  but,  daring  as 
they  were,  his  first  approach  to  leveling  be- 
tween them  the  distance  of  years,  all  the 
distance  there  was,  brought  him  a  bit  nearer 
116 


AN    INTERVIEW 

to  her.  He  said  again,  "Poor  girl !"  and  in  an 
instant  leaped  to  the  forty  years  he  had  longed 
to  possess.  At  any  rate,  his  thoughts  of  her 
to-night  could  not  exactly  be  called  protec- 
tion. 

Here  John  found  it  more  salutary  to  remem- 
ber how  good  she  had  been  to  him  while  he 
was  ill.  He  didn't  know  what  a  mother's  care 
was,  he  had  never  known  it,  but  he  couldn't 
believe  it  was  like  this.  So  far  as  sisters  were 
concerned,  they  made  the  mischief  in  a  man's 
room,  his  friends  had  told  him  so.  Every 
corner  of  the  room  where  he  was  had  a  mem- 
ory for  him  of  her  nursing  and  her  presence. 
She  had  read  by  his  window,  she  had  stood  by 
his  bed,  she  had  taken  her  place  as  soon  as  the 
professional  nurse  left — and  oh,  heavens!  the 
change!  It  was  like  waiting  for  a  cool  spell 
after  heat,  it  was  like  waiting  for  friendly 
warmth  after  bitter  cold,  it  was  like  food  after 
hunger,  and  drink  after  thirst. 

The  comings  into  his  room  of  Mrs.  Bathurst, 
117 


FIRST   LOVE 

every  single  one  of  them,  had  been  a  romance. 
John  could  see  her  across  his  threshold  with  a 
plate  of  fruit  in  her  hands.  He  had  just  waked 
up  one  day  to  see  her  waiting,  and  she  had  so 
stood  a  second,  smiling,  until  his  eyes  were 
fully  opened.  No,  certainly  it  was  not  as 
though  she  were  part  of  a  family  that  she  had 
cared  for  him.  He  didn't  feel  it  so,  at  any  rate, 
but  no  doubt  it  was  all  his  torn-fool  sentimen- 
tality, and  had  nothing  to  do  with  her.  What 
would  she  think  if  she  knew?  It  made  him 
rage  to  think  that  she  would  ridicule  his  feel- 
ings. 

There  was  no  insult  just  to  love  a  woman, 
was  there?  Mr.  Pyrnne  made  no  bones  about 
it,  and  she  tolerated  his  devotion  and  his 
asinine  leers  (poor  Nicholas  was  the  very  pink 
of  courteous  dignity).  Men  had  loved  her 
everywhere.  Peter  and  Jack  had  told  him 
something  about  their  stepmother's  life  abroad. 
She  was  used  to  it.  A  man  of  twenty-four  isn't 
a  baby,  it's  only  that  the  older  men  have  more 
118 


AN    INTERVIEW 

nerve,  more  side,  they  have  worn  off  their 
sensibility.  Every  word  of  school-boy  flirtation 
seemed  ridiculous  to  him,  and  the  girls  he  had 
courted,  like  paper  dolls.  His  sharp  thought 
cut  into  them  like  scissors.  He  repeated  to  him- 
self as  he  had  done  when  a  little  boy,  in  his 
habitual  slang.  "She's  a  corker!  She  beats  the 
record !  There's  no  one  like  her,  and  darned  if 
she  wouldn't  make  a  stone  feel !" 

Here  John  rose  and  began  to  walk  slowly 
to  and  fro  in  his  room.  If  he  should  venture 
to  make  the  least  sentimental  advance  to  her 
— and  he  hadn't,  as  he  thought  of  it,  the  least 
idea  how  he  should  do  so — she  would  send 
him  about  his  business.  The  only  thing  to  do 
was  to  have  the  folly  over  as  soon  as  possible, 
and  to  put  it  out  of  his  mind.  Here  in  her 
very  house,  seeing  her  every  day,  was  no  place 
to  cure  such  a  disease.  He  had  planned  to  go 
on  Monday,  at  any  rate,  and  this  was  Thurs- 
day. He  would  go  in  and  see  Brainard,  and 
make  his  plans  to  start  out  West.  There  was 
119 


FIRST   LOVE 

an  opening  for  him,  a  good  one,  and  Brainard 
approved.  He'd  break  new  ground. 

Poor  Bennett  realized  as  he  pondered  how 
passive  the  thought  of  her  had  been,  how  per- 
sistent, and  that  it  crowded  everything  else 
out  of  his  mind.  The  idea  of  the  West  before 
he  came  to  the  Valley  had  seemed  a  bully  one, 
and  full  of  the  charm  of  the  new,  the  untried, 
the  promising  of  great  success.  Now  the  fact 
that  it  would  take  him  thousands  of  miles  from 
her,  and  that  it  was  to  be  a  definite  break  in 
his  feelings,  made  the  idea  of  it  sink  on  his 
heart  like  lead.  He  needed  her  to  lift  up  and 
light  up  every  plan.  It  wouldn't  be  easy  to  go 
on  at  first. 

The  boy  stopped  before  his  window  and 
looked  into  the  stillness  of  the  moonlight.  It 
was  frosty  and  cold,  something  like  a  vague 
mist  blew  across  the  moon  and  over  the  lawn. 
The  night  was  growing  obscure,  it  would  be 
settling  down  to  a  true  misty  hunting  morning. 
The  last  thing  he  had  done  was  to  give  her  his 
1 20 


AN    INTERVIEW 

promise  not  to  think  of  hunting  the  next  day. 
When  she  shut  the  door  on  him  she  had 
shut  him  up  like  a  good  boy.  The  memory  of 
it  helped  him  a  little  here.  Did  he  want  to 
dangle  about  a  beautiful  woman  like  a  booby? 
Did  he  want  to  stammer  out  his  profession  and 
be  laughed  at  ?  Suppose  she  didn't  laugh  ?  Sup- 
pose she  should  attach  him  as  she  did  Nicholas 
Pyrnne?  He  nodded  his  bright  head  emphati- 
cally. "Not  for  me !"  he  said. 

He  would  put  an  end  to  the  darned  fool 
business  the  very  next  day.  He  would  ask  the 
Forsythe  girl  to  marry  him.  "She's  a  nice  lit- 
tle thing,"  John  reflected  patronizingly,  "and 
Jack  told  me  to  go  ahead,  that'll  fix  up  the 
business."  The  fact  that  he  was  so  determined 
to  end  his  passion  here  only  proved  how  little 
he  knew  of  its  real  strength.  He  knit  his  brows, 
decided  to  cut  his  sentimentality  short,  ap- 
proved himself  thoroughly,  and  felt  a  great 
satisfaction  in  his  decision,  and  a  sort  of  tri- 
umphant spleen,  too.  "I  wonder  what  Mrs. 
121 


FIRST   LOVE 

Bathurst  will  say?  How'll  she  like  it?  She 
picked  the  girl  out  for  Jack." 

But  Bennett's  plan  couldn't  last  long,  there 
was  too  little  air  in.  its  inflation,  it  sank  sud- 
denly. Cynthia  Forsythe  had  no  personality  to 
him,  she  was  nothing  but  a  paper  doll,  and  in 
her  place  was  raised  forcibly  the  picture  of  the 
living  woman  with  her  glorious  form  which 
his  young  arms  longed  for,  with  her  lips  for 
which  his  young  lips  ached.  He  breathed  a  few 
words  aloud,  stretched  out  his  arms  toward 
the  moonlight  as  though  he  would  embrace  the 
night,  and  his  words  might  have  been  a  curse 
on  his  folly,  a  protest  against  his  youth,  or  they 
might  have  been  something  like  a  prayer. 

He  decided  that  he  couldn't  go  to  sleep  in 
the  state  he  was,  and  he  put  his  smoking-jacket 
on  and  went  into  the  hall  quietly.  It  was  only 
midnight,  and  the  house  was  still  lighted.  Ben- 
nett walked  softly  and  aimlessly  toward  the 
library,  where  he  thought  he  would  get  a  book, 
and  read  and  smoke  until  something  like  sleep 

122 


AN    INTERVIEW 

came  to  him.  There  was  no  one  in  the  library, 
and,  standing  before  the  big  shelves,  he 
searched  for  something  to  attract  his  fancy. 

He  heard  just  without  the  door,  after  a  few 
seconds,  his  host's  voice  saying : 

"That's  all  right,  Cynthia,  that's  all  right, 
little  sweetheart.  Give  me  a  kiss?" 

Bennett  veered  round,  struck  to  attention, 
and  recalled  that  he  had  promised  to  champion 
the  girl,  and,  moreover,  that  he  was  going  to 
ask  her  to  marry  him  the  next  day. 

He  started  forward,  determined  to  take  the 
consequences,  whatever  they  might  be.  If 
Bathurst  should  put  him  out  of  the  house  that 
would  settle  things  at  any  rate. 

He  heard  her  make  a  little  exclamation  of 
protest,  and  then  he  came  without  a  sound  into 
the  hall. 

Bathurst  set  the  girl  free  in  a  moment,  and 
without  a  word  to  either  man  she  flew  down 
the  hall  toward  the  stairway  that  led  to  her 
rooms. 

123 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Eavesdropping?"  Bathurst  sneered,  his 
ruddy  color  faded. 

"No,"  said  Bennett  simply,  "not  much,  and 
you  don't  think  it." 

Bathurst  laughed  disagreeably.  "Are  you  as 
good  at  listening  at  key-holes  as  you  are  at 
breaking  horses'  legs  ?" 

"I'm  trying  to  remember  that  I'm  in  your 
house,"  the  young  man  said  with  an  effort,  and 
as  he  looked  at  the  red,  bloated  face,  and  real- 
ized how  much  drink  had  gone  before  his  host's 
exhibition  of  sentimentality,  his  feelings 
changed  to  plain  disgust.  Mr.  Bathurst  was 
half  drunk. 

"You  mean  that  if  you  weren't  in  my 
house  you'd  kick  me  down-stairs — do  up  the 
master  as  you  did  the  horse." 

And  John  said  to  himself,  "I've  been  under 
his  roof  six  weeks,  and  he  owes  me  a  grudge 
already." 

Mr.  Bathurst  didn't  want  his  wife  to  know. 
In  spite  of  his  freebooting,  in  spite  of  his  in- 
124 


AN    INTERVIEW 

fidelities,  he  did  not  want  Virginia  to  know. 
She  made  him  angry,  she  piqued  him,  she  de- 
'nied  him  everything,  but  he  had  still  some  hope 
of  winning  her  regard.  He  said  more  tem- 
perately : 

"Look  here,  Bennett,  is  it  after  all  any  of 
your  business?  I  shall  certainly  kiss  whom  I 
like  in  my  own  house.  Why  do  you  stand 
there  like  a  chump  and  stare  at  me?  Didn't 
you  ever  kiss  a  girl?  You'd  better  begin  if  you 
haven't."  He  fumbled  in  his  pockets  for  a 
cigar.  "Come  on  in  the  study  and  let's  have  a 
smoke,  and  I'll  ring  for  some  booze." 

He  looked  about  in  the  library  for  the 
matches,  and,  striking  one,  continued  to  speak, 
with  his  cigar  in  his  mouth. 

"She's  a  damned  pretty  girl,  and  she  liked 
it,  I  swear.  What  time  is  it,  anyway?  Half- 
past  twelve?" 

Bathurst  took  a  chair  and  pointed  to  the  one 
opposite,  nodding  to  John.  "Sit  down;  you 
make  me  nervous.  I  don't  want  to  go  to  bed. 
125 


FIRST   LOVE 

It'll  be  morning  before  you  know  it,  and  the 
hunt  is  on  for  five." 

After  a  second  of  thought  the  young  man 
sat  down,  facing  his  host. 

"Light  up,"  Bathurst  invited,  "and  break  up 
that  gloomy  face  of  yours.  You  look  like  a 
prayer  meeting.  Why  don't  you  marry  that 
giggling  little  girl,  then  you  could  kick  me  with 
some  reason?  Confound  it,  what  business  is  it 
of  yours,  anyway?  If  I  heard  a  man  kissing 
a  girl  in  the  hall  I'd  have  the  good  sense  to 
stay  where  I  was.  Hunting  to-morrow  ?" 

"No." 

"Won't  any  one  trust  you  with  a  mount  ?" 

"Dashwood  has  given  me  one,"  said  John 
rather  tartly. 

"Well,"  said  his  host,  "to  show  you  that  I 
haven't  any  hard  feeling  you  can  have  your 
pick  at  my  stables." 

The  young  man  remembered  at  his  compan- 
ion's words  how  he  had  promised  not  to  hunt. 
And  at  this  second  the  idea  that  she  cared,  and 
126 


AN    INTERVIEW 

made  a  point  of  it,  gave  him  a  flash  of  such 
great  happiness  that  it  softened  his  face  as  he 
looked  at  the  older  man;  it  did  the  work  of 
breaking  up  his  gloomy  "prayer-meeting"  ex- 
pression better  than  Bathurst  could  have  asked. 

"Guess  I'm  not  up  to  riding  to-morrow.  Lit- 
tle rocky  still." 

Bathurst  smiled  fatuously,  his  red,  bloated 
hands  on  the  arms  of  the  chair,  his  glass  of 
whisky-and-soda  by  his  side.  He  poured  in 
more  rye,  fizzed  it  up,  and  took  a  long  drink. 
He  ran  his  trembling  hands  in  his  collar,  and 
loosened  his  cravat. 

"It's  all  right  about  Ladybird,"  he  nodded 
gracefully.  "I  don't  lay  it  up  against  you,  Ben- 
nett." 

"You've  been  awfully  kind  about  it,  Mr. 
Bathurst,"  the  young  man  said.  They  had 
never  mentioned  the  subject  between  them  be- 
fore. "I  was  an  infernal  ass,  and  I  feel  like  a 
murderer.  I  haven't  said  a  word  about  it  be- 
cause the  fellows  told  me  that  you  had  asked 
127 


FIRST    LOVE 

especially  that  I  would  shut  up  on  the  subject, 
so  I've  done  so ;  but  I'm  hoping  some  time,  in 
some  way  or  other,  to — " 

"Bosh !"  said  his  host,  "nonsense !"  He  fin- 
ished his  drink.  It  was  just  the  last  swallow 
of  the  strong  liquor  needed  to  complete  his 
state.  He  could  hardly  control  his  smile,  it 
seemed  to  flutter  about  his  lips ;  but  he  had  the 
idea  that  he  was  very  affable  and  generous. 

"You  can  say  anything  you  like  about  that 
kissing  business,  I  expect  you'll  make  fun  of 
me.  I  don't  care,  Bennett,"  he  leaned  solemnly 
over  toward  the  young  man,  "I  don't  care  'bout 
any  girls,  I  only  care  'bout  one  woman.  She's 
the  only  woman  in  the  world  for  me." 

His  guest  stiffened,  his  face  grew  white  un- 
der his  ruddy  hair.  A  sickening  dislike  of  the 
man  before  him  came  on  him. 

"She's  very  cold,"  the  husband  said;  "she 
doesn't  care  for  me  now,  but  she  will."  He 
nodded  stupidly.  "You  just  watch,  she'll  come 
round  again." 

128 


AN    INTERVIEW 

He  took  his  handkerchief  from  his  pocket 
and  wiped  his  eyes,  to  which  the  inebriate  tears 
were  stealing. 

"Fill  up  your  glass,  Bennett,"  he  said,  "don't 
be  a  milksop.  You  don'  like  whisky?  Wha' 
d'youlike?" 

John  rose.  "Let's  get  to  bed,"  he  said. 
"Let's  get  a  little  sleep  before  the  meet's  on." 

Bathurst  shut  his  eyes  and  shook  his  head. 
"Coin'  t'  sleep  here,  won't  go  home  till  morn- 
in' !" 

John  got  his  arm  under  the  man's  shoulders, 
and  with  much  persuasion  Mr.  Bathurst  man- 
aged to  leave  the  library,  leaning  heavily  and 
affectionately  on  John,  finally  dragging  and 
staggering  as  far  as  his  own  door.  There  he 
held  the  young  man  back. 

"Stop,"  he  said,  "ain't  goin'  any  farther. 
Coin'  to  wait  right  here  till  Cynthia  comes 
back!" 

"Oh,  come  on !"  said  John  impatiently,  "she's 
gone  to  her  room.  You'll  see  her  at  the  meet." 
129 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Don'  tell  Mrs.  Bathurst,"  Bathurst  whis- 
pered. "Don'  tell  her." 

Bathurst's  valet,  hearing  the  approach,  came 
out  from  his  master's  room,  and  between  the 
two  men,  for  Bathurst  needed  all  the  support 
available,  the  host  crossed  his  threshold. 

"Goo'  night,  Benny,"  he  said,  shaking  John's 
hand  violently,  "you're  real  sport.  See  you 
t'morrow." 

The  man  told  John  that  he  could  manage 
without  him,  and  gathered  his  master  together, 
and  led  him  within  the  merciful  shelter  of  his 
own  door. 

John's  rooms  and  the  other  men's  rooms 
were  in  the  bachelor  quarters,  between  the 
salon  and  library,  and  the  staircase  up  which 
Cynthia  Forsythe  had  disappeared  led  to  the 
apartments  of  Mrs.  Bathurst  and  her  women 
guests. 

It  seemed  to  the  young  man  who,  set  free  by 
the  locking  of  the  host's  door,  went  to  his  own 
rooms  again,  that  he  could  not  bear  the  atmos- 
130 


AN    INTERVIEW 

phere  of  the  house  another  day.  To  be  sure, 
his  host  in  his  sickening  stupor  was  separated 
from  his  wife  by  two  halls  and  a  staircase,  but 
the  very  idea  that  there  was  between  the  man 
and  the  woman  a  bond  which  would  permit  this 
brute  to  go  to  her  if  he  wished  was  beyond  the 
endurance  of  Bennett's  clean,  vigorous  love. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  MORNING  WALK 

WHEN  John  came  down  the  following 
morning  the  foggy  mist  that  had  flown 
all  night  like  wet  sartis  across  the  country  had 
blown  off  toward  the  north,  and  the  crisp 
morning  air  was  clear  of  rain. 

Bennett  was  the  first  of  the  household  to 
come  down-stairs;  as  was  the  fashion  in  the 
Bathurst  establishment,  where  the  mistress  was 
half  continental  in  her  habits,  he  had  taken  his 
coffee  and  eggs  and  bacon  in  his  own  room. 

He  had  not  been  standing  more  than  five 
minutes  on  the  porch  facing  the  drive  and 
the  cold  dawn  when  some  one  came  out  be- 
hind him.  It  was  the  lady  of  the  house  herself. 
Mrs.  Bathurst  wore  her  pink  coat,  her  white 
stock  with  its  diamond  horseshoe,  her  black 
132 


THE    MORNING   WALK 

three-cornered  hat,  and  in  her  hand  she  held 
her  riding-crop  and  gloves. 

"I  suppose  you  couldn't  resist  the  charm  of 
early  rising,"  she  said  with  amusement.  "I 
didn't  know  that  anything  could  get  a  young 
man  up  at  five  in  the  morning  unless  he  were 
pulled  out  of  bed;  especially  since  you're  not 
going  to  ride.  I  don't  believe  you've  had  a  bit 
of  breakfast!" 

John,  who  had  scarcely  slept,  and  whose 
later  doze  had  been  disturbed  by  the  fear  that 
he  might  be  too  late,  met  her  keen  look,  for  the 
lady  wondered  what  made  him  so  pale.  The 
way  in  which  he  had  replied  to  her  kindliness 
the  night  before  had  told  her  that  she  must  be 
more  tactful  in  her  handling  of  him,  and  she 
did  not  question  him  now. 

Over  the  roads  and  the  lawns,  as  they  stood 
side  by  side  on  the  porch,  something  like  dew 
rose  on  the  stubborn  grass  and  covered  the 
brown,  dry  forests,  and  something  like  dew 
lay  between  the  sun  and  the  earth. 

133 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Doesn't  it  smell  good?"  she  said,  drawing 
her  breath.  "Gives  one  the  feeling  of  wanting 
to  swim  out  into  it,  of  going  off  somewhere. 
It's  so  fresh  and  marvelously  unspoiled." 

"It  only  makes  me  want  to  ride  like  the 
deuce,"  Bennett  responded.  "It's  a  miserable 
shame  that  I'm  not  well  enough  to  go." 

"Well,  since  you  can't,  since  you've  given  in 
so  gracefully,"  said  Mrs.  Bathurst,  "let's  walk 
over  to  the  Big  Tree  Inn.  It's  only  a  ten  min- 
utes' walk,  and  I  don't  believe  it  will  be  too 
much  for  you." 

She  could  have  suggested  nothing  that  he 
wanted  more ;  nothing  would  be  better  than  to 
leave  behind  them  the  house  with  its  master, 
Nicholas  Pyrnne,  and  the  rest,  and  go  away 
alone  with  the  lady. 

He  refused  blankly  to  take  either  hat  or 
overcoat,  and  thinking  perhaps  that  if  they  de- 
layed the  others  would  come  down  and  spoil 
their  adventure,  Mrs.  Bathurst  did  not  urge 
him,  and  he  walked  along  beside  her,  his  slim 
134 


THE    MORNING   WALK 

young  figure  tall  and  slender  as  a  small  tree, 
his  bright  head  high  with  the  pride  of  his  good 
fortune. 

Virginia  Bathurst  thought  this  friend  of  her 
stepsons  charming.  He  had  touched  her  sym- 
pathies as  a  little  boy.  Standing  between  the 
curtains  of  the  dingy,  dismantled  house,  the 
victim  of  the  auctioneer's  hammer,  dispossessed 
and  penniless,  this  little  habitant  about  whom 
the  ruins  were  fallen,  had  spoken  to  her  sym- 
pathies twelve  years  before.  She  had  known 
his  delightful  father,  and  it  was  in  affectionate 
regard  for  Mr.  Bennett  that  she  had  gone  to  the 
auction  sale,  and  there  the  purchase  of  a  few 
objects  of  art,  books,  and  China,  had  become 
of  secondary  interest  beside  the  anxious  face 
of  the  boy  who  watched  the  sale.  She  had 
never  forgotten  the  incident  or  his  visit  of  a 
few  days  at  Bathurst  House. 

She  had  aroused  his  frank,  boy  admiration, 
she  had  seen  it  in  his  intent  blue  eyes.  Brusk, 
slangy,  moody  as  he  was,  he  had  even  then  pos- 
135 


FIRST   LOVE 

sessed  that  rare  quality  which  made  him  "fasci- 
nating" to  the  girls,  and  which  had  touched  the 
woman  in  her  then.  An  older  man  might  have 
displayed  the  devotion  which,  although  he  did 
not  know  it,  red-headed,  freckled,  little  John 
Bennett  had  shown  this  selfsame  lady  twelve 
years  before. 

It  was  with  some  such  remembrance  of  him 
that  she  had  rushed  over  to  the  field  after  his 
accident,  and  lifted  his  poor  bruised  head  on 
her  knee.  It  was  with  some  such  memory  in 
her  mind  that  with  a  sudden  leap  of  her  heart 
she  had  seen  the  splendid  fellow  ride  his  race, 
had  seen  him  lifted  something  like  a  vision  on 
beautiful  Ladybird.  John  stood  out  among  the 
commonplace  men  around  him,  and  when  she 
had  seen  him  fall,  for  a  moment  she  had  cov- 
ered her  face  with  her  hands  and  been  sur- 
prised at  her  excess  of  personal  terror,  alarm, 
and  solicitude. 

With  the  perfection  of  womanliness  she  had 
nursed  the  big  chap.  If  not  too  much  to  say, 
136 


THE   MORNING   WALK 

he  wouldn't  have  pulled  through  as  he  had 
without  that  lovely  care.  She  thought  with 
something  of  pride  that  her  care  had  not  been 
altogether  in  vain,  as  he  walked  beside  her  now 
in  the  morning  sunlight,  with  his  vigorous 
swing,  his  long  steps,  close  to  her,  toward  the 
town. 

Women  who  are  ardent  by  nature  or  pos- 
sessed of  imagination  are  always  sure  to  be 
dupes  of  themselves,  as  well  as  a  prey  to  senti- 
ment, and  particularly  fit  to  suffer.  Mrs.  Bath- 
urst  was  unconscious  of  any  but  a  friendly 
interest  in  her  stepsons'  friend.  Their  conver- 
sations had  been  few,  but  Bennett  proved  an 
unusual  listener,  drinking  in  what  she  said, 
storing  her  opinions  deeply  away. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  took  things  easily,  otherwise 
she  would  not  have  been  able  to  endure  her 
life  with  her  husband.  But  she  didn't  realize 
how  often  she  had  thought  about  John;  and 
just  in  the  bright  morning  light,  struck  by  his 
pale  face  and  the  marks  of  sleeplessness,  she 
137 


FIRST    LOVE 

was  wondering  about  his  plans  for  the  future, 
and  hesitated  to  ask. 

"Have  you  been  thinking  at  all  what  you  are 
going  to  do  when  you  leave  here  next  week  ?" 
The  question  fell  with  the  decision  John  had 
made  the  night  before. 

"I'm  going  West."  He  remembered  with  a 
pang  as  he  replied  that  this  venture  on  his  part 
was  the  very  one  thing  she  had  advised  him  not 
to  do  when  they  had  talked  together ! 

His  response  was  curt,  and  his  intention  evi- 
dently fixed.  She  looked  at  him  in  surprise  and 
said,  "Oh,  really?  I  suppose  money  is  the 
thing;  and  if  you  do  go  in  for  it  you  must 
make  a  big  fortune." 

By  this  time  they  had  ascended  the  incline  to 
the  village  street,  and  the  town  clock  was  strik- 
ing six.  The  street  was  already  alive  with  coun- 
try people  and  townsfolk,  coming  to  watch  the 
meet.  Buggies  and  light  wagons,  covered  ve- 
hicles and  smart  traps,  toiled  through  the  rich 
sand  road.  Red  coats  shone  out  here  and  there. 
138 


THE   MORNING   WALK 

The  Big  Tree  Inn  blinked  with  its  green  vines 
behind  the  trees;  and  about  the  horse-block  the 
hunters,  sleek  and  slender,  thin-flanked  and 
long-legged,  gathered — shining  bays,  grays, 
and  roans — and  to  the  left  the  master  of  the 
hounds,  Donald  Dashwood,  with  his  grooms, 
held  the  black-and-white  hounds  in  leash. 

But  Virginia  Bathurst's  figure  was  the  one 
that  John  Bennett  looked  at — supple,  slender  as 
a  girl's,  there  was  a  sweep  about  her,  a  bloom, 
a  fire  that  made  her  different  to  them  all.  John 
felt  that  she  might  be  a  queen  at  a  royal  meet. 

"She  has  a  proud  face,"  he  said  to  himself; 
"I  wonder  who  would  dare  to  offend  her." 

He  could  almost  think  he  saw  a  picture  of 
her  on  some  regal  hunting  preserve,  and  read 
out,  "The  Queen  rides  to  the  hounds  to-day." 

Nicholas  Pyrnne  and  the  others  had  come 
up.  Her  horse  stood  at  the  block,  and  Vir- 
ginia's husband  lifted  her  into  the  saddle. 

Bathurst  nodded  curtly  to  John  with  a  look 
of  suspicion.  As  soon  as  he  heard  that  the  two 
139 


FIRST   LOVE 

had  walked  over  to  the  inn  Bathurst  had  said 
to  himself,  "I'll  bet  four  to  one  that  he's  been 
savin'  something  to  Virginia." 

As  attractive  as  was  the  scene  about  the  inn, 
John  saw  little  but  the  figure  of  the  woman  on 
her  roan  horse,  her  body  like  a  poppy  in  the 
pink  cloth  of  her  coat,  her  dark  little  head  set 
well  on  her  neck.  She  gathered  up  the  reins 
between  her  hands  and  moved  away. 

John  jumped  up  on  the  big  white  horse- 
block under  the  trees  and  stood  there,  the  one 
unsporting  figure  in  his  blue  serge  clothes.  He 
was  out  of  it,  a  miserable  bystander  in  the  face 
of  such  ripping  sport. 

Jack  and  Peter,  Junior,  had  come  up  with 
Miss  Cornwallis.  After  the  calls  and  shouts 
and  sallies  and  hubbub,  the  panting  of  the  dogs, 
Bennett  called  over  to  Dashwood : 

"Say — think  I'll  drive  over  and  meet  you  at 
the  cross-roads." 

But  there  was  no  response  to  this.  He  said  it 
again  more  loudly,  hoping  she  might  hear  him. 
140 


THE    MORNING   WALK 

Pyrnne  was  at  Mrs.  Bathurst's  stirrup,  shorten- 
ing it ;  she  was  bending  down  to  him,  laughing, 
unconscious  of  the  young  man  on  the  horse- 
block who  spoke  for  her  alone. 

John  thrust  his  hands  in  his  pockets  and 
glowered  at  the  gay,  cheerful  scene. 

"Go  home,  Johnny,"  Jack  called  to  him,  "and 
keep  Miss  Forsythe  company;  she  didn't 
come." 

And  Miss  Cornwallis  added,  "Oh,  do  look 
after  Cynthia,  won't  you,  Mr.  Bennett?  She 
was  too  tired  to  get  up  this  morning.  I  hated 
to  leave  her." 

Bennett  muttered  an  ungracious  word  under 
his  breath.  The  house  seemed  like  a  prison  to 
which  he  couldn't  bring  himself  to  return. 

The  hounds  were  freed.  At  a  long  blast 
from  the  horn  they  dashed  away  with  a  cry 
like  mad  creatures,  flashing  through  the  vil- 
lage street,  pounded  after  by  the  hunters. 
Whether  or  not  the  words  that  John  had  given 
out  that  he  would  ride  to  the  cross-roads  had 
141 


FIRST   LOVE 

reached  her,  Mrs.  Bathurst  didn't  look  toward 
him  until  they  started  away.  Then  she  gave  a 
glance  back,  and  saw  him  as  he  stood — six  feet 
of  blue  serge,  of  anger  and  spleen — glowering 
out  into  the  sun-filled  space  before  him,  the 
light  on  his  bare  head.  She  waved  her  crop 
gaily,  and  his  passionate,  angry  eyes  followed 
her  pink  coat  until  a  curve  in  the  road  hid  her 
from  sight.  Then  the  buggies  and  wagons  filled 
up  the  road  again,  a  butcher's  cart  slunk  out 
and  rattled  down  the  street;  the  loiterers  and 
hangers-on  about  the  village  post-office  and  the 
taverns  straggled  up  the  steps  to  the  porch  of 
the  Big  Tree  Inn.  The  odor  of  coffee  and 
bacon  floated  out  to  assure  the  world  that  the 
ordinary  course  of  events  would  pursue  the 
tenor  of  its  way,  in  spite  of  the  hunt. 

Pleasure  had  died  for  the  young  man  who, 
like  Adam  with  his  Eve  in  the  morning  of  the 
world,  had  walked  in  the  dew  of  the  early 
hours  from  Bathurst  House.  The  common- 
placeness  of  the  objects  before  him  gave  him  a 
142 


THE    MORNING   WALK 

physical  disgust.  For  the  first  time  in  twenty- 
four  years  he  was  a  victim  of  ennui ;  until  the 
hunt  returned  he  shouldn't  know  how  to  live! 

He  went  up  the  steps  of  the  inn,  and  through 
to  the  bar.  He  had  drunk  for  pleasure,  for 
good  fellowship  plenty  of  times  in  his  life,  but 
never  before  for  misery.  He  ordered  his  drink, 
and  when  it  stood  before  him  on  the  counter, 
turned  his  glass  between  his  hands,  a  frown  on 
his  face.  The  bartender,  who  had  gone  into  the 
office,  now  came  back,  his  napkin  thrown  over 
his  arm. 

"Somebody  wants  John  Bennett  on  the  tele- 
phone." 

As  though  Mrs.  Bathurst  could  have  tele- 
phoned him  from  her  saddle,  at  some  hedge  or 
ditch,  John  rushed  off. 

Bathurst  House  had  called  him  up. 

"Oh !  Mr.  Bennett,  did  you  see  Mrs.  Bath- 
urst? .  .  .  Did  she  tell  you  that  we  are  to 
take  the  dog-cart  and  follow  over  to  Moreland 
Farms  and  see  the  meet  pass  ?  .  .  .  Oh,  I'm 


FIRST   LOVE 

all  right,  thanks!  .  .  .  Want  to  go  awfully, 
don't  you?  .  .  .  You'll  be  right  over?" 

John  dashed  from  the  booth,  and  without 
stopping,  rushed  from  the  inn. 

"Hi !"  the  bartender  called  after  him,  "that 
there  cocktail !" 

"Drink  it  yourself!"  John  flung  him  a  dol- 
lar and  was  out  of  the  inn,  down  the  steps  and 
into  the  road  before  the  man  could  follow. 

"Here,  you,  take  me  over  to  Bathurst  House, 
will  you?" 

He  held  up  the  butcher's  cart  and  climbed 
into  the  seat  by  the  man's  side.  His  face  lit 
up,  he  jollied  the  butcher  boy,  drank  in  the 
fresh  odors  of  the  country,  and  his  cheeks 
began  to  warm. 

In  a  couple  of  hours,  if  only  for  a  second, 
he  should  see  her  again  as  she  shot  across  a 
meadow,  and  he  might  watch  that  dash  of  pink 
that  made  his  heart  leap  every  time  he  thought 
about  it. 

The  bartender,  as  the  butcher's  cart  rattled 
144 


THE    MORNING   WALK 

down  the  road  toward  the  hill,  turned  the  cock- 
tail back  into  a  bottle,  and  put  the  dollar  in  his 
pocket.  He  was  not  a  drinking  man. 

"Wonder  what  made  that  fellow  leave  his 
drink  ?  Girl  on  the  wire,  I  guess.  When  girls 
don't  drive  a  man  to  drink  they  make  him  sour 
on  his  food,"  he  said,  as  though  he  regarded 
his  cocktails  in  the  light  of  repasts. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  PROPOSAL 

AN  hour  later,  driving  across  the  country 
with  Miss  Forsythe,  John  calmed  to 
something  like  reason  and  common  sense.  For 
a  good  part  of  the  night  he  pondered  over  his 
state  of  nerves  and  his  folly,  and  he  was  able  to 
see  that  he  was  very  much  of  an  idiot,  that  he 
needed  sound,  strong  measures  to  cure  his 
imbecility.  Cynthia  Forsythe  had  welcomed 
him  back,  the  only  other  guest  at  Bathurst  had 
insisted  that  he  take  some  kind  of  refreshment 
that  went  by  the  name  of  early  luncheon  before 
they  started,  and  a  pretty  girl  is  at  her  best 
when  she  urges  a  man  to  be  comfortable.  Cyn- 
thia had  served  him  herself,  and  sat  later  by 
his  side  in  the  buggy,  not  in  the  least  like  a 
girl  who  has  passed  a  horrid  night,  who  has 
been  bothered  to  death  by  her  host,  and  who  is 
146 


THE   PROPOSAL 

gently,  though  truly,  unhappy  about  her  own 
unfortunate  love  affair. 

The  young  people  rode  out  from  Bathurst 
to  follow  the  meet  in  a  classic  buggy,  a  long- 
stepping  horse  between  the  thills,  and  the  pretty 
Washington  girl  by  Bennett's  side,  after  feed- 
ing him  and  giving  him  to  drink,  did  her  best 
now  to  amuse  the  absorbed  young  man.  Self- 
ishly suffering  and  sentimental  as  he  was,  no 
topic  would  have  interested  him  greatly  but  to 
talk  of  himself  or  of  Mrs.  Bathurst.  Cynthia 
did  not  lead  to  the  subject  of  the  lady ! 

She  referred  to  the  "licking"  he  had  given 
his  school- fellow  at  the  party,  and  from  here 
John  went  on  to  tell  her  something  about  his 
boyhood. 

"There  at  Jones'  Mills,"  he  pointed  with  his 
whip  across  country,  "there's  the  steeple  of  the 
church  they  told  us  to  look  out  for.  We'll 
make  it  all  right  by  this  road  to  the  left,  and 
I  guess  they'll  cross  us  there." 

They  were    vithin  three  miles  of  the  point 


FIRST  LOVE 

where  they  were  to  wait  for  the  meet,  and  the 
young  man  hurried  his  horse  wantonly  up  the 
hill.  On  either  side,  between  their  low  fences, 
spread  the  meadows  of  the  Valley  country- 
stubble  and  dry  furrow,  ditched  and  harvested 
fields,  all  first-class  hunting  land,  with  its  deeps 
and  curves  and  little  knolls  of  forests  like 
shadows  over  the  hills,  here  and  there. 

"Of  course,  there's  just  a  chance  that  they 
may  not  pass,"  Cynthia  said.  She  could  have 
borne  it  very  well.  But  her  companion  was 
more  sure. 

"Oh,  I  guess  they'll  come  by  all  right!"  He 
couldn't  imagine  that  he  would  be  disappointed 
in  that  flying  sight  of  her. 

"Speaking  of  shooting,"  John  said  with 
inadvertency,  "Mrs.  Bathurst  gave  me  my  first 
gun.  I  was  a  little  shaver — it  was  twelve  years 
ago." 

They  rolled  down  one  big  hill  and  climbed 
slowly  up  the  other,  the  horse  breathing,  the 
rustle  of  the  wheels,  the  creak  of  the  leather, 
148 


THE    PROPOSAL 

and  the  song  of  the  thills  in  their  thongs  an 
undertone  to  all  they  said.  John  told  Cynthia 
the  story  of  the  auction  at  his  old  home  in 
James  Street.  It  was  nothing  but  a  boyish, 
quick,  crude  tale,  without  any  embellishment, 
but  under  his  words  his  romance  lay,  and 
its  golden  thread  ran  through  the  tale.  It  was 
unmistakable,  even  to  this  girl.  The  reins 
lay  loose  on  the  horse's  back,  the  whip  hung 
loose  over  the  dashboard.  John's  head  was 
bent,  his  eyes,  smiling  and  intent,  were  fixed 
on  some  scene  not  in  the  Tallahoe  meadows. 

He  talked  out  his  secret,  kept  until  now  so 
jealously;  he  brought  it  before  the  girl's  eyes 
until  it  was  plain  as  day,  and  though  told  by  a 
college  boy  in  the  simplest  of  terms,  without 
diction  or  rhetoric,  the  story  made  a  picture. 
Cynthia  could  see  him  with  his  little  heart 
bursting  as  they  auctioned  off  his  father's  gun ; 
Cynthia  could  hear  his  sob  as  he  shut  himself 
up  in  his  s  nail  bedroom;  and  Cynthia  could 
see  Mrs.  Bathurst  sitting  on  John's  bed,  in 
149 


FIRST   LOVE 

her  spick-and-span  dress,  her  hand  lying  white 
on  the  velvet  brown  of  the  corduroy  hunting 
clothes. 

"Wasn't  it  bully  of  her?" 

"Yes,"  said  Miss  Forsythe  gravely. 

"I  guess  no  woman  ever  gave  a  boy  anything 
he  wanted  more.  I  can  never  forget  how  that 
gun  in  the  corner  of  my  room  made  me  feel." 
He  laughed  softly  to  himself.  "I  don't  doubt 
I  made  a  fool  of  myself  over  it,  I'm  sure 
I  hugged  it.  I  can  remember  now  how  the 
wood  shone  on  the  handle.  I've  never  really 
wanted  anything  since,  you  know,"  he  said 
with  young  arrogance,  "but  it  has  been  sure  to 
come  along  sooner  or  later." 

"You're  a  very  lucky  fellow." 

The  laugh  went  a  little  out  of  his  voice  as  he 
thought  of  the  much-wanted  something  which 
had  never  come.  "I  don't  know  about  that.  I 
suppose  a  man's  luck  has  to  change  sometime." 

John's  story,  which  had  brough'-  him  over- 
whelmingly to  the  one  subject  in  which  he  was 
150 


THE    PROPOSAL 

interested,  and  to  the  point  of  their  drive, 
left  him  meditative.  But  it  had  the  opposite 
effect  on  Miss  Forsythe.  As  though  she  didn't 
want  to  give  herself  time  to  think  of  anything 
whatsoever,  she  now  led  the  conversation  to 
herself,  and  John,  half  listening,  was  pleasantly 
entertained.  He  rather  liked  her  giggle,  as 
Bathurst  called  it,  and  he  liked  her  thoroughly, 
and  as  far  as  he  could  see  anything  else  in  the 
great  white  light  of  his  infatuation,  he  saw  this 
little  candle  throw  its  gentle  beams. 

"We'll  stand  here,  I  think."  He  drew  the 
horse  up  on  the  hilltop.  "They  ought  to  come 
along  out  of  that  patch  of  woods  about  now." 

A  clear  horn  blast  cut  the  air.  The  dogs 
flew  out  first,  Peter  Bathurst,  Junior,  followed, 
and  half  a  dozen  others  seemed  to  shake  out  of 
the  little  woods  and  scatter  over  the  fields. 

Miss  Forsythe,  standing  up  in  the  buggy, 
cried,  "There's  Grace  Cornwallis!  Doesn't 
she  ride  like  a  breeze!  She's  the  first  of  the 
women.  I  do  hope  she'll  get  in  at  the  death." 


FIRST   LOVE 

Peter  Bathurst,  Senior,  came  last ;  his  horse 
had  never  hunted  before,  and  he  was  in  a  fury 
with  her. 

"Here !"  he  cried,  riding  to  the  buggy,  "help 
me  fix  this  cursed  curb,  will  you,  Bennett?  I 
didn't  expect  to  get  in  at  the  death  with  this 
infernal  cow  I'm  riding;  but  neither  did  I 
expect  to  have  to  stop  and  milk  her  in  the 
middle  of  the  fields.  She  can't  go  at  all." 

"Where,"  asked  Cynthia  eagerly,  "are  the 
others?" 

"Nick's  horse  went  lame,  caved  in  at  More- 
land  Farms,  and  my  wife  couldn't  think  of 
anything  better  to  do  than  to  drop  out  and  stop 
over  with  him  there.  I  guess  they'll  get  lunch 
of  some  kind.  They've  telephoned  for  a  trap  to 
come  for  them,  and  they'll  go  right  home. 
You'll  come  on  over  to  luncheon  at  the  Lew- 
isons',  you  two,  won't  you?" 

John  set  free  the  bit  he  was  holding. 

"I  guess  that's  all  right,"  and  Bathurst 
started  away  as  the  last  riders  pelted  from  the 
152 


"Doesn't  she  ride  like  a  breeze!"     Page  151 


THE   PROPOSAL 

woods  and  rode  over  toward  -the  opposite 
fields. 

For  a  moment  the  buggy  with  the  two  young 
people  rested  on  the  knoll,  then  John  turned  his 
horse  about  and,  without  asking  the  girl  where 
she  wanted  to  go,  started  home. 

Cynthia  wanted  to  go  nowhere  but  where 
John  should  choose,  and  she  sat  back  quietly, 
waiting  for  him  to  speak.  It  must  have  been 
a  wait  of  over  a  mile. 

The  bitterness  at  his  heart  was  cruel.  The 
horse  he  drove,  the  reins  he  held  between  his 
knees,  the  lovely  midday  country  on  either 
side,  the  calls  of  the  late  birds,  the  peace  and 
charm  of  the  land  as  they  drove  through,  the 
dear,  kind  little  creature  at  his  side,  whatever 
joy  and  goodness  there  might  have  been  in 
it  all  blotted  itself  out,  and  he  suffered  with 
jealousy  at  the  thought  of  another  man's  wife 
in  the  company  of  yet  another  man.  He 
couldn't  help  it ;  he  didn't  call  up  a  lot  of  moral 
strength  to  fight  against  it ;  he  was  flying  before 
153 


FIRST   LOVE 

it,  and  for  some  time  he  let  himself  chafe  and 
suffer.  No  doubt  he  didn't  understand  her  at 
all,  this  older,  beautiful  woman,  who  awakened 
as  well  his  admiration  and  his  chivalry.  She 
knew  life  a  great  deal  better  than  he  did;  she 
understood  it ;  she  knew  what  she  wanted,  and 
as  far  as  he  was  concerned,  of  course,  he  wasn't 
in  her  consideration  at  all.  No,  there  was  no 
doubt  about  that.  Why  should  he  be?  A 
bitter  smile  curved  his  young  lips  as  he  thought, 
and  the  brightness  died  out,  leaving  him  pale 
and  gray,  the  lines  set  and  hardened. 

He  couldn't  bear  it,  he  wouldn't  bear  it. 
She  loved  hunting,  she  had  said  she  did,  she 
had  talked  about  this  meet  for  weeks,  she  was 
the  best  rider  on  the  field,  she  had  a  bully 
horse,  there  was  no  reason  why  she  shouldn't 
have  got  the  brush,  and  she  must  have  wanted 
the  trial.  Why  should  she  knock  off  with  that 
man  and  spend  her  hunting  morning  in  a  farm- 
house with  him?  If  her  husband  took  it  easily 
— well,  that  was  Bathurst's  business;  as  far 
154 


THE    PROPOSAL 

as  John  Bennett  was  concerned  he  had  no  right 
to  her,  anyway;  to  her  he  was  nothing  but  a 
foolish  boy.  It  was  none  of  his  business,  and 
he  wasn't  going  to  let  it  make  him  suffer  like 
this;  he  was  going  to  kill  it  right  now.  He 
wouldn't  take  it  home  and  sleep  with  it  another 
night,  this  unsatisfied,  dreadful  love.  He  was 
going  to  set  himself  free. 

The  idea  of  leaving  Bathurst  House  in  the 
morning  with  nothing  to  fill  his  mind,  with 
nothing  to  help  him  in  his  sacrifice,  was  impos- 
sible. 

"See !"  Miss  Forsythe  broke  in,  "there  ahead 
of  us  in  the  road  is  a  squirrel.  Isn't  he  pretty  ?" 

Cynthia's  hands  were  clasped  in  her  lap, 
her  charming  face  was  as  sweet  as  a  brier  rose. 
With  a  tremendous  impulse,  which  he  pushed 
on  by  all  his  force  of  character  and  by  his  great 
need  of  help  and  comfort  and  support,  John 
said: 

"I  can't  tell  you  how  horribly  I  felt  about 
last  night,  Miss  Forsythe." 
155 


FIRST    LOVE 

The  girl's  face  dyed  a  vivid  scarlet. 

"Please  don't  speak  of  it,"  she  said. 

"I  will,"  John  replied.  "When  I  came  out 
on  Bathurst  I  felt  like  wringing  his  neck,  and 
I  didn't  do  anything  but  go  back  into  the 
library  and  watch  him  drink,  and  then  help  him 
to  his  room;  you  see,  I  couldn't,  that's  the 
truth.  He's  been  very  decent  to  me,  and  the 
only  thing  I  wanted  to  do  is  to  get  out  of  his 
house." 

"Oh,  really!"  she  exclaimed.  "Do  you  feel 
so  strongly  as  that  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  John.  "I  feel  just  that  way,  and 
I'm  going  to-morrow  and  no  later." 

She  made  no  answer  to  this. 

"Next  week,"  Bennett  went  on,  "I'm  start- 
ing out  West.  As  I  told  you  before,  I  don't 
know  whether  you  take  any  interest  in  it  or 
not — I'd  like  to  think  you  do — I'm  going  to 
start  right  in  there  to  make  some  money.  I've 
got  a  little  opening,  and  I  guess  I  can  pull 
through." 

156 


THE   PROPOSAL 

"Of  course,"  Cynthia  said,  and  he  could  hear 
that  she  was  breathing  fast.  "Of  course  you'll 
pull  through,  you're  that  kind.  You  know  you 
said  that  everything  came  your  way  you 
wanted." 

Bennett  started  to  speak,  but  just  then,  not 
very  far  distant,  came  the  silver  note  of  the 
hunting-horn.  He  gathered  up  his  reins,  spoke 
to  the  horse,  touched  him  with  the  whip,  and 
they  flew  along  the  road,  scattering  the  squir- 
rels to  flight,  turned  a  curve  which  brought 
them  out  to  an  open  view,  and  there,  a  little  be- 
low them,  down  over  the  valley  from  their  little 
eminence,  they  saw  the  dots  of  scarlet,  and  the 
flying  hunters  pushing  toward  a  single  point. 

"Poor  fox!"  Miss  Forsythe  said,  "I  think 
they've  run  him  down." 

"Do  you  know,"  Bennett  said  excitedly,  "I 
believe  we  are  at  the  kill.  See,  the  whole  lot 
of  them  are  stopping  there.  Hear  the  dogs!" 

She  leaned  a  little  forward,  and  stood  up 
by  his  side,  holding  on  to  the  buggy  seat.  As 

157 


FIRST   LOVE 

she  stood  so  John  Bennett  turned  about  and 
looked  up  at  her.  It  was  very  hard  to  find 
just  the  words.  He  might  have  said,  "Look 
here,  I  want  you  to  help  me  to  pull  my  life 
straight."  If  he  had  done  so  Cynthia  Forsythe 
would  have  understood. 

John  said,  "Will  you  marry  me?" 

It  was  sudden  and  entirely  unexpected.  The 
words  in  all  the  world  that  Cynthia  Forsythe 
wanted  to  hear  were  said  by  the  right  man. 
She  stood  firmly  in  the  buggy,  tightened  her 
lips,  and,  incapable  of  making  them  say  what 
she  wanted,  she  only  shook  her  pretty  head. 

Overwhelmed  with  surprise,  John  said,  "Do 
you  mean  to  say  that  you  turn  me  down?" 

The  girl  sank  back  on  the  seat  from  which 
she  had  just  risen. 

"Please  don't  ask  me,"  she  whispered. 
"Please — I  must  say  no." 

Nothing  could  have  surprised  him  more. 
His  first  sensation  was  one  of  foolish  anger, 
dreadful  anger  against  her;  then  he  remem- 
158 


THE    PROPOSAL 

bered  that  she  was  a  flirt.  He  had  thought  she 
loved  him,  that  his  suit  with  her  was  as  good 
as  won,  that  he  had  only  to  ask  to  make  her 
marry  him. 

He  started  his  horse,  not  once  turning  his 
eyes  to  the  field  or  to  the  gathered  hunters 
at  the  kill.  They  drove  along  for  some  time 
in  perfect  silence.  The  girl's  heart  beat  so 
hard  that  John  might  have  heard  it.  He  heard 
nothing,  however,  but  his  own  foolish  resent- 
ment and  wounded  pride.  Everything  was 
against  him,  nobody  wanted  to  have  anything 
to  do  with  him.  For  the  first  time  a  sense  of 
unhappy  discouragement  came  over  his  young 
heart.  Tallahoe  was  a  cursed  place  to  him; 
he  had  made  one  dreadful  blunder;  he  had 
fallen  into  a  deplorable  snare,  and  now  he  had 
made  an  ass  of  himself  again. 

These  were  his  first  feelings,  and  before  he 

could  follow  them  logically  out  and  turn  again 

and  properly  press  his  suit,  as  he  should  have 

done,  they  both   heard  behind   them  a  call 

159 


FIRST   LOVE 

Across  Miss  Forsythe's  refusal  came  the 
charming  voice  of  Mrs.  Bathurst. 

"Hello!"  she  cried  gaily.  "Hello,  you  two!" 
And  the  next  moment  she  had  ridden  beside  the 
buggy.  In  her  scarlet  coat  and  small  hat  she 
reined  her  horse  directly  by  Bennett's  side. 

"I'll  ride  home  with  you,  if  you  don't  mind. 
Have  you  seen  the  meet  ?  Wasn't  it  mean  that 
I  had  to  drop  out  ?  I  thought  I'd  catch  up,  but 
it's  too  late  now.  Wasn't  it  a  pretty  sight  ?" 

Bennett  looked  up  at  her,  and  her  face,  bril- 
liant, sparkling,  and  her  voice,  made  him  with 
one  great  throb  of  his  heart  thank  Heaven 
that  the  little  girl  at  his  side  had  "turned  him 
down." 


160 


CHAPTER  XIII 

A  CONFESSION 

THERE  was  a  hunt  dinner  that  night  at 
Bathurst  house,  and  a  ball,  and  young 
Bennett  was  the  only  man  in  a  black  coat — 
he  wouldn't  wear  the  pink  because  he  had 
flunked  the  meet.  As  well,  not  dancing,  he 
felt  himself  to  be  a  rank  outsider,  but  for 
nothing  in  the  world  would  he  have  sneaked 
up-stairs  and  missed  what  sight  he  could  get 
of  his  hostess. 

He  was  grateful  to  Miss  Forsythe  for  not 
coming  down  to  the  ball.  He  had  learned  from 
Peter,  Junior,  that  she  was  "seedy"  again  and 
not  to  appear;  otherwise,  he  had  decided  that 
the  only  decent  thing  for  him  to  do  would 
be  to  leave  Tallahoe  and  go  on  to  Buffalo. 
This,  as  he  expressed  it,  would  have  made  him 
wild ;  he  wanted  to  see  his  hostess,  and  she  was 
161 


FIRST   LOVE 

well  worth  looking  at  this  night.  The  violet 
color  of  her  gown  became  her  well,  its  sheath 
of  rich  tone  brought  her  firm  white  flesh  into 
the  fairest  contrast.  She  wore  pearls — pear- 
shaped  drops  of  them  in  her  ears,  a  collar  of 
them  with  bands  of  diamonds,  and  there  was 
a  velvet  sumptuousness,  a  regal  look  about  her 
that  every  one  of  her  guests  admired.  The 
Buffalo  papers  next  day  spoke  of  her  as 
"queenly,"  and  mentioned  that  Worth  had 
made  Mrs.  Bathurst's  dress  for  the  hunt  ball. 

Nicholas  Pyrnne,  whom  she  had  left  to  eat 
humble  pie  alone  in  the  farm-house,  when  she 
had  ridden  off  to  join  the  young  people  in  their 
buggy,  said  to  her  when  they  had  finished 
dancing : 

"I'm  going  back  to  Albany  to-morrow,  Vir- 
ginia, and  I'm  not  going  to  see  you  any  more." 

"You're  rather  a  coward,  my  poor  Nicho- 
las." 

He  smiled*  not  seeming  to  have  heard  her 
call  him  so. 

162 


A   CONFESSION 

"At  any  rate,  unless  you  send  for  me,  I 
shan't  be  around  again." 

Pyrnne  waited  with  her  near  the  musicians, 
between  the  dances. 

"Don't  boast,"  Mrs.  Bathurst  said;  "you 
must  never  say  to  the  fountain,  'I  won't  drink 
of  your  waters.' ' 

"I  shall  not,  however,"  Pyrnne  repeated, 
"see  you  any  more  unless  you  need  me,  and 
then  you  know,  Virginia,  you  have  but  to  send 
the  word." 

"Tell  me,"  she  asked  abruptly,  "do  you  think 
that  Peter  has  been  flirting  with  Cynthia 
Forsythe?" 

Nicholas  shrugged  without  answering. 

"She's  been  in  a  state  of  nerves,  and  al- 
though I've  tried  tactfully,  I  couldn't  find  out 
what  was  the  matter  with  her!" 

Her  friend  smiled.  "Why,  I  told  you  the 
other  night  that  she  was  in  love  with  Bennett !" 

"I'm  responsible  for  her  to  her  mother,"  she 
replied. 

163 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Nonsense,  my  dear  lady!  You  can't  turn 
a  pretty  girl  of  twenty  loose  and  make  a  hand- 
some woman  of — " 

"Don't  mind  me!"  laughed  Mrs.  Bathurst. 
"I  was  afraid  my  husband  had  annoyed  her." 

And  Nicholas  said  coolly:  "I  think  it's 
more  than  likely  that  he  has." 

She  flushed.  "How  horrid  of  him,  how  dis- 
gusting!" 

Here  the  partner  who  was  to  dance  with  her 
crossed  the  floor.  It  was  her  husband,  well- 
groomed,  well-dressed,  with  the  important 
swagger  of  the  man  who  runs  the  show.  He 
might  well  be  proud  of  the  leading  lady,  and 
he  was  proud  of  her,  she  was  superb.  He  had 
been  temperate  at  dinner  in  order  to  dance 
with  her,  and  he  was  steady  now. 

As  Pyrnne  left  them  together,  Bathurst  said 
to  his  wife:  "You  wore  that  war-paint  in  the 
queen's  drawing-room,  didn't  you?" 

"I  believe  so ;"  her  voice  had  several  qualities 
in  it,  and  the  one  she  used  for  her  husband 
164 


A    CONFESSION 

Peter  could  flatter  himself  was  all  his  own. 
She  slipped  her  hand  in  his  arm  and  crossed 
the  room  with  him. 

"Have  you  bothered  Cynthia  since  she's 
been  here,  Peter?" 

It  was  an  unwelcome  question,  beautiful  as 
she  was,  charming  him  as  she  did. 

"Curse  that  blabbing  fool !"  he  said  brutally. 
"I'll  kick  him  out  of  my  house  yet." 

"Whom  do  you  mean?" 

"I  mean  that  Bennett  boy;  he  told  you." 

"He  told  me  nothing — nothing.  But  it 
seems  there  is  something  to  tell." 

"Oh,  don't  get  tragic!"  he  returned,  shrug- 
ging. "I  did  kiss  her,  that's  all,  and  Bennett 
saw  me.  Where's  the  crime?" 

Controlling  her  disgust,  his  wife  repeated : 
"If  John  saw  you,  he  was  too  discreet  to  speak 
about  it.  It  hasn't  any  importance,  as  you  say. 
Cynthia  couldn't  hide  the  fact  from  me  that 
something  unpleasant  had  happened." 

"Well,"  repeated  Bathurst,  twisting  his 
165 


FIRST    LOVE 

mustache,  "it  ain't  a  crime,  is  it  ?  You  oughtn't 
to  fill  your  house  with  pretty  girls." 

"It's  not  even  worth  a  discussion,"  said  his 
wife,  "excepting  that  she's  under  my  care." 

"Well,  she's  nothing  to  me!"  said  the  host 
brutally.  "She's  nothing  but  dough;  they  all 
are  but  you,  and  you  don't  think  I'm  fit  to 
throw  a  bone  to." 

The  waltz  had  begun.  "Shall  we  dance?" 
he  asked  almost  politely.  And  with  anger 
against  her  beauty  and  her  hauteur,  and  know- 
ing that  there  was  more  than  one  man  in  Tal- 
lahoe  who  envied  him,  he  put  his  arm  around 
his  wife  and  led  her  out  on  to  the  floor. 

The  dinner  had  been  an  early  one  and  the 
dancing  was  short.  As  the  household  had  had 
a  strenuous  day,  the  guests  went  early. 

Bennett  had  sulked  through  the  evening, 
giving  himself  up  to  his  moods,  watching  the 
passing  of  the  beautiful  figure  of  his  hostess, 
feeling  miserable  and  disheartened.  Early  in 
the  evening  he  went  up-stairs  to  his  room  after 
166 


A   CONFESSION 

bidding  her  good-by  and  thanking  her,  for 
he  had  determined  to  go  away  on  the  first 
train  the  following  day.  There  was  a  cynicism 
in  his  voice,  and  a  look  of  weariness  on  his 
face  that  at  his  age  would  have  struck  her  as 
being  almost  droll  if  she  had  not  thoroughly 
understood  his  state  of  mind. 

He  had  barely  closed  his  door  for  the  night, 
going  into  the  room  where  she  had  nursed  him 
and  where  he  had  passed  so  many  hours  of  real 
unhappiness,  when  a  knock  fell,  and  he  threw 
the  door  open  so  wide  and  swiftly  that  it 
showed  how  well  he  knew  the  sound  and  how 
he  welcomed  it.  Mrs.  Bathurst  was  standing 
there. 

"Let  me  come  in  a  minute,  won't  you?  I'm 
going  to  sit  down  and  talk  to  you  a  bit." 

Looking  as  though  he  would  forbid  her,  the 
face  of  the  blond  young  man  flushed  and  his 
half -sullen  expression  did- not  change.  Her 
frankness,  her  kind  nod  to  him,  her  coming  as 
she  did  when  all  the  house  was  rustling  by  in 
167 


FIRST   LOVE 

the  corridors  to  rest,  her  clear,  sweet  voice  as 
she  called  him  John  showed  how  maternally 
she  thought  of  him — like  this  she  would  have 
gone  in  to  see  Jack  and  Junior  at  the  end  of 
the  day. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  took  her  place  in  his  big 
leather  chair,  over  by  his  bureau,  close  to  his 
outlay  of  simple  toilet  articles.  As  she  talked 
to  him  her  fingers  touched  the  toilet -cover ; 
one  by  one  she  lightly  touched  the  little  articles, 
the  ebony  button-hook,  the  shoe-horn.  They 
were  sacred  to  him  from  that  night. 

The  dark  folds  of  her  lustrous  dress  fell 
about  her  on  the  floor.  Against  the  chair  her 
head  melted  into  the  shadow.  There  was  a 
little  light  behind  her  and  out  of  it  her  face  and 
her  white  neck  and  arms  gleamed. 

"You  haven't  been  quite  frank  with  me." 

Bennett  stood  rigidly  before  her.  She  was 
quite  right  there!  Frank  with  her?  "Jove!" 
he  thought,  "I  wonder  what  she'd  say  if  I 
should  be  frank!" 

168 


A   CONFESSION 

"You  don't  mind  my  coming  in,  do  you, 
like  this,  as  I  would  go  to  Jack  or  Junior?" 

He  was  able  to  assure  her  that  he  did  not 
mind. 

"You  see,  we've  talked  quite  a  lot  about 
things  together,  while  you  were  convalescing, 
and  you  took  me  into  your  confidence  a  little, 
didn't  you?  So  you  won't  think  I'm  prying 
or  curious — only  friendly,  if  I  want  to  know  a 
little  about  your  plans  before  you  go?  Sit 
down ;  let's  talk  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour." 

He  took  his  place  in  the  chair  next  hers 
and  tried  to  listen  to  what  she  said,  and  to 
think  of  what  she  was  saying.  They  had 
begun  this  day  together;  when  she  had  come 
down-stairs  she  had  found  him  in  the  mists  of 
the  morning.  It  seemed  that  they  were  going 
to  close  the  day  side  by  side.  There  was  some- 
thing awfully  sweet  about  it. 

"You've  been  too  kind  for  anything,"  he 
managed  to  tell  her,  "and  you  know  how  I  feel 
about  it,  every  bit." 

169 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Oh,  taking  care  of  you  was  more  fun  than 
anything  I've  known  for  a  long  time,"  she 
answered  affectionately,  looking  at  him  with- 
out the  shadow  of  any  feeling  but  pure  kind- 
ness. "I  played  trained  nurse  pretty  well, 
didn't  I  ?  I  loved  it !  But  I  don't  think  you've 
been  quite  fair!  I  mean  to  say,  you  let  me 
be  an  awful  bore  with  my  advice  when  you 
were  ill — and  all  the  time  you  were  laughing 

% 

in  your  sleeve !" 

"Oh,"  the  young  fellow  exclaimed,  shocked, 
"I  never  did  such  a  thing!  I  wanted  to  hear 
everything  you  thought.  If  I've  had  any  plans 
they  haven't  been  worth  mentioning." 

He  was  not  the  kind  to  make  a  dash  for 
sympathy;  his  friend  knew  it.  Sitting  there 
before  her,  big  and  strong,  his  beautiful  head 
well  placed  on  young  shoulders  whose  strength 
had  never  been  tried,  she  thought  of  him  as 
a  boy — disappointed  in  first  love,  too  proud  to 
show  his  hurt. 

"You're  really  going  West,  directly?" 
170 


A   CONFESSION 

"I  shall  see  Doctor  Brainard,  first,  and 
talk  with  him."  He  gave  a  half -embarrassed 
laugh.  "None  of  my  plans  is  cast  iron !" 

"I  wish  you'd  talk  with  Nicholas  Pyrnne," 
Mrs.  Bathurst  suggested  cordially;  "he's  an 
awfully  good  adviser." 

"I  wouldn't  bother  anybody;  that  western 
job's  a  sure  thing  for  a  fellow  with  a  little 
capital.  But  it's  perfectly  bully  of  you  to 
care,"  he  added  gratefully. 

The  door  was  open,  and  in  the  hallway  he 
heard  Jack  and  Junior  go  by,  and  the  latter 
stuck  his  head  in. 

"Giving  John  a  curtain  lecture?  You'd 
better  listen  to  her,  Bennett;  she's  a  corker; 
and  if  she  tells  you  not  to,  you'd  better  not! 
She  knows!" 

Junior  withdrew  his  head  and  the  curtain 
dropped  its  folds.  His  were  the  last  steps  to 
pass  the  door. 

The  lady  asked  a  few  practical  questions 
about  John's  plans,  questions  which,  with 
171 


FIRST   LOVE 

averted  eyes,  the  young  chap  answered  as  well 
as  he  might.  His  mind  was  too  overwhelmed 
by  the  consciousness  of  her  to  be  lucid  on  any 
other  subject.  He  was  saying  to  himself: 
"In  just  about  a  minute  she'll  get  up  and  go 
— she'll  be  gone." 

And  in  a  few  minutes  she  rose.  As  he  got 
up  heavily  out  of  his  chair  he  raised  his  eyes 
to  her,  and  she  saw  in  them  a  dumbness  of 
misery  which  she  took  to  be  his  disappointed 
love  for  Cynthia  Forsythe.  She  had  not  been 
able  yet  to  bring  herself  to  speak  of  the  subject. 
John  was  too  silent,  he  was  too  shy.  Once  or 
twice  she  had  thought,  "The  poor  boy  hasn't 
known  how  to  make  love,  that's  the  trouble." 

There  was  a  divine  kindness  in  her  face  as 
she  stood  there,  and  he  felt  that  he  was  a  bore 
to  be  so  silent  before  her,  so  unresponsive. 
She  didn't  dream  the  fiery  struggle  that  was 
going  on  in  him  and  that  he  was  blind  with 
the  rush  of  his  senses — deafened  by  the  cry 
within  him,  and  weakened  with  the  effort  to 
172 


A   CONFESSION 

keep  back  from  her  ears  the  call  of  his  young 
being.  But  he  must  speak  or  she  would  think 
him  a  fool. 

"You've  always  been  ripping  to  me,  Mrs. 
Bathurst,  ever  since  I  was  a  little  kid."  He 
pointed  over  to  the  corner.  "Ever  since  the 
night  when  father's  gun  stood  there,  behind 
the  door." 

She  laughed.  "Oh,  dear,"  she  exclaimed, 
"you've  no  idea  how  amusing  you  were,  how 
funny.  Why,  you  couldn't  even  thank  me, 
you  were  as  red  as  fire." 

"As  red  as  my  hair,  I  guess,"  Bennett  said, 
a  little  bitterly.  "Well,  I  can't  thank  you  now, 
either.  You've  been  a  perfect  brick." 

These  were  far  from  being  the  words  which 
his  heart  suggested.  These  hurt  him — they 
were  wrung  out  of  him;  he  had  other  things 
to  say — things  that  came  imperiously — words 
he  didn't  know  before  were  in  the  vocabulary 
and  that  he  had  never  used.  He  was  being 
taught  by  passion.  But  he  held  and  forced  the 
173 


FIRST   LOVE 

endearments  back,  and  put  lame,  clumsy 
phrases  in  their  place.  Always  smiling,  with 
the  delightful  little  crinkles  around  her  mouth 
and  eyes  and  the  cleft  in  her  chin  which  John 
adored,  Virginia  Bathurst  said:  "You've 
nothing  whatsoever  to  thank  me  for,  John 
Bennett;  I'm  naturally  glad  you're  well  and 
able  to  go.  But  I'd  like  to  feel  that  you  went 
away  happy.  Of  course,  I  know  you'll  be 
successful.  I  shall  miss  you." 

He  said  "Oh,"  under  his  breath.  The  cur- 
tain fell  before  the  open  door,  and  though  no 
sound  whatsoever  could  be  heard  from  his 
room  in  the  hall,  she  had  dropped  her  voice. 

She  came  near  him — put  that  beautiful  hand 
of  hers  on  the  sleeve  of  his  coat. 

"My  dear  boy,"  she  said  very  sweetly,  "don't 
think  I'm  an  awful  meddler;  and  you  haven't 
said  a  word  to  me,  but  I  know  you'll  forgive 
my  asking — " 

He  had  never  been  so  near  her ;  things  began 
to  come  true.  The  stuff  which  his  daring 


A    CONFESSION 

imagination  had  cut  into,  the  woof  of  his  day- 
dreams and  night  dreams  was  beginning  to 
be  real.  .  .  .  Her  dress  held  her  lightly,  it 
almost  touched  him;  her  lips,  her  arms,  her 
bare,  beautiful  neck;  the  lines  of  her  throat, 
her  chin,  the  cleft  in  it,  the  rare  bloom  of  her 
coloring,  the  perfume  of  her,  the  fragrance  of 
her,  the  woman  she  was.  "She  smiled  at  me 
like  that,"  memory  said,  "when  I  was  a  boy." 

"I  don't  like  to  think  you're  having  a  hard 
time,"  she  was  going  on,  "but  I  don't  want  to 
intrude  on  your  confidence,  John." 

He  murmured:  "I  don't  know  what  you 
mean." 

No,  he  wouldn't  look  at  her  any  more.  Trie 
sense  of  her  hand  on  his  sleeve  went  to  his 
very  flesh. 

"You  see,  Cynthia's  here  in  my  care  and 
she's  told  me." 

He  broke  the  spell  violently.  "She  did — 
did  she?  Well,  that's  all  right." 

His  friend  looked  startled.  "Wfiy,  you 
175 


FIRST   LOVE 

bear  it  splendidly.  Of  course  you  would.  She's 
a  dear,  she's  a  darling ;  you  know  I  wanted  her 
for  Jack,  but  of  course  we've  given  that  up 
long  ago.  She's  very  young;  don't  give  up 
hope,  don't  take  this  as  definite." 

The  young  man  she  was  consoling  said 
rapidly : 

"Oh,  but  I  do,  I  do  take  it  definitely !  She 
can't  go  back  on  her  word  now !" 

His  tone,  his  manner  was  so  unexpected 
that  her  hand  dropped  from  the  arm  of  the 
inconsolable  lover. 

"Oh,  you  mustn't  let  it  make  you  bitter, 
John.  Why,  just  think  how  men  have  waited 
and—" 

He  thrust  his  hands  behind  his  back  and 
clenched  them  there. 

"It  doesn't  seem  to  be  any  secret,"  he  said, 
"since  Miss  Forsythe  has  told  you.  I  did  ask 
her  to  marry  me  and  she  refused,  and  I've 
never  been  so  glad  of  anything  in  my  life." 

Virginia  looked  at  him  in  despair;  she  Had 
176 


A   CONFESSION 

come  warm  from  the  confidence  of  the  pretty 
girl  who  had  cried  in  her  arms. 

"Why,  you  don't  care  for  her !" 

"Not  a  rap." 

"Really!"    She  looked  at  him  astonished. 

"I  was  an  ass,"  John  said  heartily ;  "I  don't 
know  why  I  made  such  a  fool  of  myself!  Of 
course,  if  she  had  accepted  me  I  would  have 
stood  by,  but  I  don't  care  a  thing  for  any  girl 
alive." 

She  laughed  softly  in  spite  of  herself,  the 
adorable  laugh  of  a  woman  who  knows  life 
and  understands,  and  who  is  amused  by  a  fresh 
experience. 

"Really,  John,  you're  perfectly  shocking. 
Why,  you're  a  cruel  flirt!  You  mustn't  do 
such  things;  above  all  not  with  a  girl  like 
Cynthia." 

And  he  agreed  with  feeling. 

"You  can  bet  I  won't;  the  next  girl  might 
take  me." 

"I'm  almost  angry  with  you,"  she  went  on 
177 


FIRST   LOVE 

seriously,  and  then  she  stopped,  for  she  didn't 
want  him  to  think  for  a  moment  that  .Cynthia 
was  unhappy.  She  put  out  her  fiand  .indul- 
gently. 

"Good  night,  you  bad  boy.  I  came  to  con- 
sole you,  I  thought  you  were  in  the  blues.  I 
wonder  if  you  are  quite  frank  with  me?"  Then 
she  added,  "But  I  don't  think  you  need  me." 

"I  do  need  you." 

He  didn't  know  the  voice  that  spoke,  nor  did 
Virginia,  and  she  didn't  know,  as  these  words 
passed  his  lips,  the  man  who  stood  in  the  place 
of  John  Bennett. 

"I  don't  need  anything  else  or  want  anything 
else." 

She  paled  and  looked  at  him  startled;  then, 
mistress  of  the  situation,  tried  to  smile.  She 
put  her  hand  on  his  shoulder. 

"Foolish  boy,"  she  murmured,  "foolish  boy." 

But  the  boy  had  gone,  and  the  man,  swayed 
by  the  passionate  tide  of  life,  the  vast  ocean 
rising  in  his  heart,  was  not  to  be  withstood. 
178 


A    CONFESSION 

Without  another  word  of  protest  he  put  his 
arms  around  her  and  poured  on  her  face  and 
eyes  the  kisses  he  had  dreamed  of,  with  all  the 
ardor  of  his  first  love.  He  rained  his  kisses 
on  her  face,  on  her  lips,  her  eyelids,  and  her 
lips  again,  and  sighed  as  into  a  bed  of  flowers. 
Afterward — and  here  he  lingered  on  the 
memory — he  could  not  dream  otherwise  than 
that  she  bore  his  passion  gently — gently!  but 
as  he  feasted  and  murmured  the  words  that 
called  her  dear,  she  made  herself  free,  pushed 
him  from  her,  and  fled  from  hin\  leaving  him 
dazed,  bewildered,  triumphant. 


179 


CHAPTER  XIV 

MEDITATIONS 

MRS.  BATHURST  gained  her  own  room 
and,  sitting  down  on  her  divan,  cov- 
ered her  face  with  her  hands.  Although  there 
was  no  one  to  see  her,  and  only  the  familiar 
objects  of  her  own  room  were  around  her, 
she  had  the  sensation  of  being  acutely  ob- 
served, and  she  blushed,  and  her  eyes  grew 
young  again,  like  a  girl's. 

"I've  never  been  so  surprised  in  my  life, 
never!"  She  laughed  a  little,  and  her  laugh 
was  tremulous,  and  she  gave  a  long  sigh. 

"John  Bennett,  that  little  boy,  that  boy! 
How  dare  he?  Why,  he's  mad!  How  per- 
fectly ridiculous!" 

So  she  spoke  of  it  to  herself,  but  her  light 
words  and  this  attitude  of  mind  regarding 
her  sudden  whirlwind  of  experience  were  not 
1 80 


MEDITATIONS 

the  real  emotions  the  young  man's  daring  had 
roused.  If  it  had  been  madness  that  had  made 
him  do  what  he  had  done,  it  was  the  sweetest 
lunacy,  there  was  no  doubt  about  it  As 
though  she  still  felt  the  caresses  that  had  rained 
on  her,  she  passed  her  hand  over  her  brow  and 
cheek,  over  her  neck,  and  flushed  again.  Her 
words  to  Nicholas  Pyrnne  on  the  horse-show 
grounds  came  back  to  her:  "A  red-headed 
boy!  Why,  he's  a  man,  my  dear  Nicholas,  a 
beautiful  man!"  And  this  was  what  John 
Bennett  had  grown  to  be;  he  had  matured 
terribly,  marvelously,  and  in  the  knowledge 
that  he  had  showered  on  her  the  first  love  of 
his  heart  there  was  something  so  beautiful 
that  her  own  heart  thrilled.  How  wild  of  him ! 
How  bold  of  him!  How  dare  he? 

She  would  not  see  him  again — he  would  go 
to-morrow  at  two  o'clock. 

"Of  course,  he'll  write  me  a  long  letter.  I 
foresee  what  it  will  be  like,  full  of  apologies, 
of  prayers  for  pardon;  he  will  think  he  has 
181 


FIRST   LOVE 

insulted  me  in  my  own  house,  he'll  be  dread- 
fully ashamed.  Poor  John !" 

She  had  gone  in  to  talk  to  him  in  the  friend- 
liest manner,  to  encourage  him  about  Cynthia. 
She  wanted  to  give  him  hope,  and  her  con- 
solation had  not  been  needed.  What  a  shock- 
ing flirt  he  was!  Why,  he  didn't  care  at  all 
for  Cynthia.  And  now  where  she  had  said 
"Poor  John!"  she  said  "Poor  Cynnie!"  with 
greater  enjoyment  of  the  adjective. 

The  girl's  image  faded  out,  and  nothing  but 
John  remained  in  the  foreground,  and  stayed. 
She  saw  him  as  he  sat  before  her  in  his  room, 
with  glowing  eyes  that  eluded  hers.  They 
were  a  boy's  eyes  still.  She  had  seen  tears  on 
those  lashes  years  ago ;  she  had  watched  them 
when  Bennett  was  delirious  at  the  Big  Tree 
Inn,  and  she  had  then,  in  taking  care  of  him, 
learned  every  line  of  the  young  face,  every 
turn  and  molding  of  that  beautiful  head  with 
its  strong,  close-growing  hair,  reddish  at  the 
ends,  and  the  determined  chin  and  the  fresh 
182 


MEDITATIONS 

lips.  The  face  was  a  boy's  face  still.  Of  what 
had  he  been  thinking  as  she  had  talked  to  him 
to-night  ?  His  reserve  and  his  silence  she  had 
found  disconcerting,  and  now,  as  she  realized 
that  all  that  time  he  had  been  thinking  of  her 
in  such  a  manner,  she  glowed  through  and 
through. 

She  had  done  very  wrong  to  go  in  on  him 
like  this;  she  had  been  wrong  throughout  in 
taking  nothing  but  his  youth  into  account,  and 
he  was  evidently  ages  older  than  Jack  and 
Peter,  Junior.  During  their  times  together  in 
his  sick-room  it  had  been  a  pleasure  to  talk  to 
him.  Simple  as  his  mind  was,  poor  conversa- 
tionalist as  he  was,  his  tastes  were  so  clean  and 
vigorous,  and  she  had  planned  for  him  and 
thought  for  him  more  than  she  knew. 

He  stood  up  before  her  now  as  she  mused, 
like  a  youthful  Adam,  and  there  was  a  light 
about  him,  a  radiance.  She  had  thought  he 
didn't  know  how  to  win  Cynthia  Forsythe,  or 
how  to  make  love.  He  wasn't  the  novice  she 
183 


FIRST   LOVE 

had  fancied.  He  had  learned  very  perfectly 
and  very  suddenly.  He  had  been  like  primeval 
man  in  his  daring,  and  she  was  too  real  a 
woman  not  to  be  touched  by  his  passion. 

As  she  mentally  approached  a  danger-point, 
John's  altered  voice  seemed  again  to  say  to 
her,  "I  do  need  you!  You're  the  only  one  I 
need."  And  the  blood  began  to  dye  her  throat 
and  cheek.  For  half  a  second  her  heart  rocked 
as  though  it  were  in  a  cradle,  swung  by  the 
biggest  forces  of  the  world.  She  said  aloud 
in  her  silent  room,  "No,  John  Bennett,  you 
don't  need  me,  and  I'm  the  one  thing  in  the 
world  that  you  mustn't  want — that  you  mustn't 
want." 

She  rose,  as  if  she  hoped  by  walking  up 
and  down  the  room  very  fast  to  dispel  the 
dangerous  emotions  that  were  gaining  way, 
She  unfastened  the  jewels  from  her  hair  and 
neck  and  ears,  and,  denuded  of  her  ornaments, 
looked  defiantly  in  her  dressing-glass. 

"Heavens!"  she  confessed,  "it  won't  be  long 
184 


MEDITATIONS 

before  I'm  an  old  woman.  How  ridiculous! 
Have  1  lost  my  last  remnant  of  common  sense  ? 
I  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  myself." 

But,  her  jewels  put  aside,  the  bodice  of  her 
violet  dress  lying  like  a  mass  of  flowers  on 
the  chair,  the  heavy  skirt  trailing  across  the 
sofa,  half  dressed,  she  fell  once  again  to 
dreaming.  She  did  not  see  her  own  beauty,  re- 
flected in  the  glass  before  her,  for  looking  over 
her  bare  shoulder  the  young  face  of  John  Ben- 
nett was  imaged.  This  was  what  his  silence  had 
meant,  then !  This  was  why  he  was  always  at 
her  side.  She  remembered  that  he  had  threat- 
ened to  ride  for  the  sole  reason  that  it  might 
arouse  her  interest,  and  continued  to  remember 
with  amused  tenderness  the  manifold  indica- 
tions of  his  growing  sentiment. 

Only  last  year  she  had  told  herself  that  she 
was  sick  of  sentiment,  that  there  wasn't  a  man 
in  the  world  who  could  rouse  any  feeling  in 
her  but  disgust.  Her  life  with  her  husband, 
the  series  of  flirtations  in  Europe,  the  courting 


FIRST   LOVE 

of  men  of  the  world,  the  stale  eternal  phrases, 
they  had  palled  on  her;  they  all  had  said  the 
same  thing  more  or  less  well.  She  was  a 
woman  made  to  win  men's  admiration  and  to 
arouse  desire,  and  now,  on  her  return,  Nicholas, 
with  his  old  fidelity,  had  renewed  his  old  suit 
She  had  felt  like  a  cliff  against  which  the  waves 
had  beaten  for  a  long  time,  and  their  touch  and 
their  song  were  cold  to  her,  and  now  suddenly 
all  the  landscape  promised  to  burst  into  the 
bloom  of  May,  the  cliff's  sides  to  adorn  them- 
selves with  bloom,  and  the  sea,  like  a  summer 
sea,  smiling,  beautiful,  promised  to  mirror 
the  flowers. 

"He  must  not  love  me,"  she  said.  "If  he 
really  loves  me,  he  must  cease  to  do  so."  And 
she  tried  to  think  of  it  as  only  the  natural  out- 
come of  his  long  propinquity  to  her,  as  a  pass- 
ing fancy  that  would  soon  die  away. 

"He  will  go  to-morrow;   I  won't   answer 
his  letter.    There'll  be  the  question  in  his  mind 
that  he  has  offended  me,  then  he  will  forget." 
186 


MEDITATIONS 

But  the  persistence  of  her  remembrance 
of  those  last  few  moments  in  his  room  forced 
her,  frightened  her  into  knowing  that  John 
Bennett  did  more  than  fancy  her,  and  that  not 
only  passion  ran  through  those  furtive,  seek- 
ing, wonderful  caresses,  but  love.  Here  again 
she  put  one  hand  above  her  eyes.  "Oh,  dear !" 
she  murmured  like  a  girl,  "why,  it's  quite 
terrible,  isn't  it?  If  he  really  is  going  to  begin 
like  this,  where  will  he  end,  poor  dear?  He 
knows  so  wonderfully  how  to  care." 

What  had  she  been  thinking  of?  How  blind 
she  had  been!  Why,  she  had  been  culpable 
toward  him,  culpable.  Of  course,  she  wouldn't 
make  a  tragedy  out  of  it.  Her  husband  kissed 
girls  under  her  roof,  John  had  kissed  many  a 
girl  before;  and,  singularly  enough,  it  didn't 
amuse  her  to  think  about  it,  although  she  knew 
perfectly  well  he  had  never  given  himself  like 
this.  Still,  she  wouldn't  even  make  a  point  of 
it.  He  would  go,  and  she  would  laugh  at 
him,  figuratively,  and  it  would  all  be  over. 
187 


FIRST   LOVE 

Of  course  he  would   conquer  and  win  new 
fields,  and  marry — marry  soon — 

A  bitter  smile  came  to  her  lips,  and  here  her 
reverie  brought  her  up  to  the  one  thing  she 
wanted  to  avoid,  her  own  part  of  it.  If  she 
could  only  forget  herself  now,  leave,  dismiss 
the  thought  of  John  Bennett  and  his  young 
ecstasy,  really  laugh  at  it,  be  indulgent,  pardon 
— if  such  a  word  were  in  the  case — and  for- 
get. .  .  . 

Virginia  sighed,  and,  rising  from  her  toilet 
table,  completed  her  preparations  for  the  night. 

But  before  she  could  decide  to  put  out  her 
light,  the  musing  woman  found  that  she  was 
absolutely  called  on  to  reckon  with  this  horrid 
self  that,  unless  it  is  forgotten,  keeps  the 
human  being  from  peace.  She  confessed  now 
that  she  had  been  thinking  about  John  Bennett 
for  weeks;  she  had  been  selfish  with  him  and 
she  had  mentally  and  sentimentally  kept  him  to 
herself.  Here  was  a  lovely  girl  under  her  roof 
with  whom  he  would  undoubtedly  have  fallen 
1 88 


MEDITATIONS 

in  love  if  he  had  not  been  brought  into  con- 
templation of  the  older  woman's  more  subtle 
charms. 

But  this,  her  own  condemnation  of  her  con- 
duct, of  her  thoughtlessness,  possibly,  was  not 
what  she  dreaded — she  was  a  big-hearted, 
large-minded  woman,  and  could  pardon  others 
and  pardon  herself.  That  wasn't  the  question. 
Nothing  in  her  life  had  been  so  dear  as  the 
nursing  of  John  Bennett.  No  presence  under 
her  roof  had  been  so  bright  and  so  dear  to  her 
as  his.  She  had  never  had  a  child,  and  he 
didn't  seem  like  a  son,  but  the  charm  of  his 
youth,  of  his  good  looks  and  his  dearness  had 
made  her  forget  all  about  the  son  she  used  to 
long  for;  he  made  her  happy.  That  was  the 
truth  of  it ;  it  had  made  her  happy  to  have  him 
there,  and,  although  there  wasn't  a  moment 
when  she  had  acknowledged  it,  nothing  had 
made  her  happy  at  all  for  years  and  years  and 
years. 

She  sat  on  her  bed  in  her  white  dressing- 
189 


FIRST   LOVE 

gown,  her  arms  folded  across  her  lovely  breast, 
the  stillness  of  the  night  around  her,  and  there 
wasn't  a  line  of  her,  a  bit  of  her,  not  beautiful 
and  not  made  for  love. 

"He  will  go  to-morrow  very  early.  I  shall 
be  very  angry  with  him  and  I  shall  never  see 
him  again;  I  shall  try  not  to  see  him  again. 
Why,  I'm  almost  old  enough  to  be  his  mother 
— and  what  am  I  going  to  do  when  he  is 
finally  gone!" 

Now  she  had  brought  herself  up  face  to 
face  with  something  she  wanted  to  say  before 
she  tried  to  sleep.  "What  is  he  thinking  now? 
What  is  he  doing  now?"  But  she  couldn't 
linger  with  those  thoughts.  "I  let  him  kiss 
me,  I  didn't  resist,  I  submitted  to  him.  What 
in  Heaven's  name  does  he  think  of  me?" 

She  put  out  her  hand  and  touched  the  light's 
button  and  the  welcome  darkness  came  between 
her  and  John  Bennett's  thoughts,  whatever 
they  might  be. 

As  the  kind  cloak  fell  across  the  room  and 
190 


MEDITATIONS 

on  her  white  figure  and  on  her  white  bed 
where  John  had  gazed  with  such  emotion  a 
few  nights  before,  all  was  blotted  out  in  the 
darkness.  Still  she  huddled  musing  there: 
"That  boy,  that  boy!" 

Being  never  a  woman  of  aimless  medita- 
tions, being  a  strong  woman  and  a  very  real 
one,  unwilling  to  meet  the  problem  which  her 
senses  put  before  her,  unwilling  to  let  herself 
relive  again  those  moments  in  John's  arms,  that 
now  in  the  darkness  and  the  night  promised 
to  be  a  time  of  temptation  sweet  as  it  was 
dangerous,  Virginia  Bathurst,  with  a  mighty 
will,  thrust  the  memories  back,  back,  bravely, 
finely,  and  well.  And  she  refused  to  answer 
the  great  big  question  that  pounded  at  her 
heart.  She  couldn't  cope  with  that  question 
to-night,  neither  could  she  admit  the  figure  of 
the  man  from  whom  she  had  run  away.  She 
could  not  let  John  Bennett,  big,  beautiful 
John  Bennett,  in ;  neither  could  she  do  without 
him. 

191 


FIRST   LOVE 

She  smiled  in  the  darkness  and  her  smile 
was  bewitching.  If  she  could  have  seen  how 
the  crinkles  came  around  her  lips  and  her 
eyes! 

"Foolish,  foolish  boy,"  and  the  word  was  a 
wand  by  which  she  made  to  reappear  the  little 
red-headed  boy  who  stood  between  the  cur- 
tains in  James  Street  house,  who  looked  at 
her  with  his  eager  eyes.  So  she  saw  him  again, 
and  she  had  then  known  his  heart  and  what 
he  yearned  for,  and  she  had  decided  to  give  it 
to  him,  if  it  took  a  gold  mine!  Little  John 
Bennett  came  and  sat  beside  her,  grown  fairy- 
like,  adorably  small  and  safe,  and  she  could 
turn  her  lovely  face  toward  him  without  fear. 
Between  them  lay  the  corduroy  hunting  clothes, 
and  her  hand  rested  on  them  and  Virginia 
Bathurst  cried  out  to  the  vision : 

"John  Bennett,  John  Bennett,  why  did  you 
grow  up?    Why  didn't  you  stay  a  little  boy? 
Now  that  you  have  grown  up — I  don't  know 
what  is  going  to  happen  to  us  both !" 
192 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE  WOMAN-HATER 

THE  soil  of  the  state  in  which  John 
Bennett  found  himself  and  where  he  was 
to  strike  his  roots  deep,  if  he  expected  to  have 
any  kind  of  a  harvest,  was  strange  ground  to 
him.  But  he  was  an  American  and  therefore 
a  citizen  of  the  world,  and  he  took  his  place 
quickly.  He  bought  a  half  interest  in  a  lemon 
ranch  in  the  valley  near  Santa  Barbara,  and 
cast  his  luck  with  a  man  from  Boston,  Bob 
Furniss. 

Any  one  to  have  seen  Bennett  standing  be- 
tween the  doorway  of  the  bungalow  and  the 
lemon  groves,  in  his  riding  breeches,  his  loose 
white  shirt,  his  sombrero  under  his  arm  and 
his  shining  head  bare — any  one  to  have  seen 
him  standing  so  in  a  clear  bright  light,  whist- 
193 


FIRST   LOVE 

ling  as  he  viewed  his  orchard,  would  never 
have  thought  him  a  victim  of  hopeless  love. 

His  chum  found  him  good  company:  an 
all-round  sport,  sympathetic  in  every  point  of 
view  but  one.  He  was  not  sympathetic  on  the 
topic  of  women.  Furniss  couldn't  interest  his 
partner  in  this  subject.  The  other  man  claimed 
to  be  a  woman-hater. 

The  new  partner  of  Chiluvista  was  five 
years  younger  than  Furniss,  who  had  his  own 
affairs  of  the  heart  to  occupy  him  and  who 
learned  to  keep  his  confidence  to  himself,  for 
Bennett  was  a  very  poor  audience. 

One  night  as  the  two  men  sat  out  in  the 
lucent  dusk,  the  Bostonian,  who  prided  him- 
self on  his  tenor  voice,  sang  bravely  out  into 
the  stillness  of  the  evening: 

"Believe  me,  if  all  those  endearing  young 
charms." 

In  spite  of  the  singer's  enthusiasm  and  his 
194 


THE    WOMAN-HATER 

theatrical  phrasing  of  the  old  song,  at  the  end 
Furniss  said : 

"Bosh!  Go  out  into  the  grove  there  and 
curse,  Johnny.  You're  a  heathen.  Jove,  but 
some  woman  must  have  turned  you  down 
hard!" 

His  companion  replied  vaingloriously :  "Let 
me  tell  you  that  no  woman  ever  said  no  to  me 
in  her  life!" 

"It  would  have  done  you  a  rattling  lot  of 
good  if  she  had,  I  dare  say,"  retorted  Furniss. 
And  John  stalked  off,  his  figure  soon  lost 
among  the  silver-leaved,  pale-fruited  trees. 

The  pungent  air  of  the  groves  had  sickened 
him  at  first  with  its  sweetness,  and  everything 
had  been  bitter  and  hateful  when  he  came  out 
to  Chiluvista.  He  felt  himself  an  outsider,  and 
a  man  doomed  to  be  unhappy  from  his  youth. 

Before  a  month  had  gone  by  that  very  youth 

had  rebelled  and  Bennett  regained  his  balance 

with  rather  a  discomforting  ease!    He  hated 

to  acknowledge  that  he  took  real  pleasure  in 

195 


FIRST    LOVE 

life,  or  in  his  riding  and  his  work,  and  in 
making  a  success  of  his  venture,  but  surely 
and  kindly  the  air  into  which  he  breathed  love 
sighs  began  to  make  him  new  again. 

Nevertheless,  the  woman-hater,  in  spite  of 
his  undamaged  health  and  spirits,  was  a  lover 
such  as  Bob  Furniss  would  never  be  in  all  his 
practical  life. 

The  boy  had  gone  mad  on  one  subject,  and 
he  would  rather  have  cut  down  the  luscious 
groves  with  their  mellow  balls  before  their 
time  and  have  starved  on  a  pile  of  the  rotting 
fruit  than  have  let  Furniss  guess  his  malady. 

The  journey  west,  the  long  train  travel  in 
which  he  had  been  carried  like  an  inanimate 
parcel,  his  arrival  at  Santa  Barbara,  his  meet- 
ing with  Furniss,  his  rapid  bargain,  his  settling 
at  the  ranch,  all  had  been  performed  by  a  man 
enveloped  in  a  mist  of  excitement,  hardly  con- 
scious of  the  material  world. 

A  fortnight  or  so  went  by  before  he  really 
woke  up,  and  very  early  one  morning,  tired  of 
196 


THE   WOMAN-HATER 

lying  staring  at  the  gaining  light,  he  threw  on 
his  clothes  and  went  outside  and  looked  around. 

Like  a  forest  of  elfin  trees — silver  trees 
where  the  pale  fruit  looked  argent  and  the 
leaves  folded  them  around  mistily,  the  lemon 
groves  stretched  in  regular  squares  and  ob- 
longs. There  was  a  fortune  in  this  vegetable 
checker-board.  Bennett  and  Furniss  would  be 
rich  if  they  waited  long  enough  and  had  pa- 
tience enough.  When,  he  was  a  rich  lemon 
grower,  would  she  care? 

Their  Mexican  boy  was  rubbing  down  a  new 
horse  in  front  of  the  stable  shack,  in  the  open. 
Bennett  put  his  hand  on  the  warm,  soft  nose. 

"Is  that  the  mare  Mr.  Furniss  bought  yes- 
terday? Got  any  name?  Call  her  Ladybird." 

In  this  way  he  re-created  the  horse  he  had 
wantonly  killed  on  that  day,  and  himself  came 
to  life  with  the  new  Ladybird.  A  little  later 
he  sent  this  mare  to  Mr.  Bathurst,  and  made 
the  gift  so  graciously  that  the  gentleman  actu- 
ally accepted  it  without  protest  and  was  pleased. 
197 


FIRST    LOVE 

But  he  never  wrote  to  his  lady,  who  waited 
for  the  boyish  apology  in  vain,  for  he  didn't 
ask  to  be  forgiven.  He  had  gone  away  in  all 
his  triumph ;  and  if  she  remembered  him  at  all 
she  was  obliged  to  remember  him  as  an  ardent 
delinquent 

He  didn't  deny  himself  the  pleasure  of  think- 
ing of  her  in  his  exile,  and  he  took  her  with 
him  everywhere.  In  the  clear  atmosphere  of 
Chiluvista  she  moved  between  the  lines  of  lemon 
groves,  rode  with  him  over  the  country  on  a 
horse  by  his  side ;  she  was  like  a  girl  with  him, 
the  difference  in  their  ages  entirely  vanished; 
sometimes,  drawing  near  in  his  fancy  to  this 
visionary  woman,  the  young  man  saw  that  she 
had  become  so  much  of  a  girl  that  she  almost 
lost  the  resemblance  to  Virginia. 

It  was  long  before  he  forgot  how  he  had 
held  her  in  his  arms,  and  it  broke  his  heart  at 
the  end  of  two  years  to  find  that  he  couldn't 
quite  recall  the  perfume  of  her  gown  and  that 
the  memory  of  the  subtle  scent  had  become 
198 


THE    WOMAN-HATER 

as  faint  as  flowers  on  a  distant  height  whose 
breath  is  only  brought  by  some  captious 
breeze. 

The  young  men's  post  was  brought  by  the 
Mexican  boy  at  supper  time.  There  was  one 
woman  servant;  but  Furniss  was  vain  of  cer- 
tain dishes  that  he  cooked  well,  and  he  had 
prepared  a  savory  stew  and  hung  affectionately 
over  the  steaming  dish  waiting  for  John  to 
come  to  supper. 

When  he  appeared  and  finally  threw  down 
the  letters,  Bob  put  his  hand  authoritatively 
over  the 'pile. 

"Now  you're  not  going  to  look  into  those 
until  we  are  through  with  grub.  It  will  be 
the  end  if  you  begin  on  these." 

But  his  partner  had  torn  a  newspaper  open 
and  Furniss  saw  the  color  leave  his  tan,  then 
rush  back  again  until  the  young  man's  temples 
beat ;  the  sheet  shook  in  his  hand.  He  crumpled 
it  up  and  thrust  it  in  his  pocket. 

Then  he  sat  down  to  feed. 
199 


FIRST   LOVE 

In  the  night  the  Bostonian  was  wakened 
out  of  a  sweet  slumber  by  his  companion  call- 
ing to  him : 

"Say,  old  man,  I  want  to  put  something 
straight  I  said  to  you  to-day." 

"What  the  deuce,"  growled  the  other,  "are 
you  waking  me  up  for?" 

And  his  friend  returned  imperturbably,  "I 
told  you  no  girl  ever  turned  me  down,  didn't 
I?" 

Furniss  rolled  over. 

"Well,  it  was  a  lie;  I'd  forgotten  when  I 
said  that.  The  only  girl  I  ever  asked  to  marry 
me  turned  me  down." 

Furniss  was  breathing  happily ;  he  had  fallen 
asleep  again,  but  Bennett  went  tranquilly  on : 
"I  wanted  to  set  it  straight,  old  man,  I  had  to 
set  it  straight." 

He  lay  on  his  narrow  bed,  his  arms  above 

his  head,  smiling  into  the  dark.     He  wasn't 

thinking  of  Cynthia  Forsythe  and  his  proposal 

in  the  buggy;  he  was  seeing  with  a  painful 

200 


THE   WOMAN-HATER 

vividness  the  older  woman,  the  beautiful  Mrs. 
Peter  Bathtirst.  He  saw  her  pearls  in  her  hair 
and  around  her  throat,  and  the  violet  dress ;  he 
found  now  that  he  could  perfectly  recall  its 
touch  and  its  perfume,  as  he  could  recall  the 
sweetness  of  the  woman  and  the  sense  of  her. 
He  held  out  his  arms  with  a  low  cry  in  the 
dark. 

The  next  day,  without  any  hesitation,  John's 
partner  found  and  opened  the  newspaper  which 
the  young  man  had  left  in  his  room.  One 
whole  page  of  the  supplement  was  devoted  to 
the  picture  of  the  celebrated  Mrs.  Peter  Bath- 
urst  at  Newport,  whose  husband  had  just  been 
elected  to  congress.  Indifferent  as  such  por- 
traits usually  are,  this  one  was  successful:  the 
pose  was  queenly,  the  face  was  alluring,  and 
Bob  Furniss  saw  and  felt  the  charm  which  had 
made  men  Virginia's  slaves  all  through  her 
life. 

"Woke  me  up  at  three  A.  M.  to  gas  to  me/' 
he  grinned.  "Talked  about  the  other  girl. 
20 1 


FIRST    LOVE 

Mrs.  Peter  Bathurst,  of  Syracuse.  Why,  that's 
Bennett's  own  town.  Poor  Johnny,"  he 
laughed,  "poor  old  Johnny.  He  calls  himself 
a  woman-hater!" 


202 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  PRESENTIMENT 

MRS.  BATHURST,  after  passing  the  day 
on  the  yacht  where  her  husband  offered 
lobster,  terrapin  and  champagne  to  a  foreign 
prince,  came  back  to  Newport  alone  by  the 
tender,  for  she  had  promised  to  ride  before 
dinner  with  a  friend. 

All  the  way  in,  all  the  way  up  to  the  Belfries, 
as  the  Bathurst  place  was  called,  all  during  the 
time  when  she  was  dressing  for  her  ride,  and 
later,  as  she  rode  beside  the  Englishman,  she 
had  a  singular  feeling  of  elation,  a  presenti- 
ment of  some  awfully  good  luck.  She  told  the 
Marquis  of  Penhaven  about  it,  and  took  the 
augur  to  be  all  for  herself. 

"If  you're  in  such  good  spirits,"  said  the 
marquis,  "why  don't  you  give  me  a  little  hap- 
piness?" 

203 


FIRST    LOVE 

"I'm  riding  with  you,"  Virginia  replied. 

"Unless  it  ends  the  way  Browning's  poem 
does—" 

And  she  interrupted  him:  "For  Heaven's 
sake,  don't  ask  me  to  end  anything  of  Brown- 
ing's!" 

They  had  finished  their  ride  and  were  on 
their  way  back  to  the  Belfries,  and  in  a  few 
moments  would  come  in  full  cry  of  their  kind. 
The  marquis  leaned  over  to  his  companion  and 
put  his  hand  on  the  pommel  of  her  saddle. 
"Won't  you  give  me  one  bit  of  hope?  Give 
me,"  the  Englishman  persisted,  "the  right  to 
go  away  happy." 

Virginia  listened  almost  eagerly,  because  she 
hoped  to  hear  in  what  he  was  saying  some 
sound  which  would  tell  her  that  the  delight 
which  the  day  seemed  to  promise  her  was  about 
to  declare  itself,  then  she  suddenly  pushed  his 
hand  away*  There  was  nothing  in  what  he 
said  out  of  the  commonplace.  She  shook  her 
head  and  spoke  to  her  horse,  and  the  English- 
204 


THE    PRESENTIMENT 

man,  as  he  set  the  animal  free,  said  savagely: 
"I  hope  that  Bathurst  will  drink  himself  to 
death." 

"If  he  did,"  Bathurst's  wife  responded 
tartly,  "it  wouldn't  make  the  least  bit  of  dif- 
ference between  us.  Please  don't  speak  to  me 
of  this  again." 

In  the  ride  home  there  was  nothing;  there 
was  nothing  in  the  brisk  pace  of  their  horses 
that  fetched  them  to  the  door  of  the  Belfries, 
to  justify  Virginia's  exuberance.  The  fact 
that  she  was  making  a  man  unhappy  did  not 
cloud  her  sense  of  something  good  to  come; 
"the  song  of  a  secret  bird"  sang  deliciously 
deep  down  in  her  heart. 

They  crossed  the  big  hall  of  the  Belfries, 
where  several  groups  of  her  guests  and  visitors 
sat  around  the  tea  tray,  and  the  Marquis  of 
Penhaven  left  her  side.  Without  going  up- 
stairs to  bathe  and  dress,  she  went  through  the 
wide-open  door  of  the  porch,  which  framed 
a  picture  of  the  sea,  and  below  the  gray  rocks 
205 


FIRST   LOVE 

the  waters  spread  away,  a  white  yacht  here 
and  there,  like  a  midsummer  butterfly  on  a 
shining  field. 

There  was  a  fresh  breeze,  and  Virginia,  with 
her  face  turned  toward  the  water,  drank  in  the 
salt  perfume.  The  air  touched  her  gently  on  the 
brow  and  cheeks;  she  breathed  in  with  delight 
the  peerless  evening,  warm  with  late  summer 
yet  with  autumn  vigor  on  the  wings  of  the 
wind. 

Down  the  far  end  of  the  porch,  as  she  raised 
her  eyes,  she  saw  a  man  standing,  looking,  as 
she  looked,  out  on  the  water.  His  back  was  to 
her;  he  was  bareheaded,  his  feet  were  set  well 
apart,  his  head  thrown  back.  There  were  sev- 
eral tall  men  in  Newport,  with  shoulders  like 
Atlas.  Virginia  wondered  which  one  of  the 
young  fellows  this  was,  then  realized  that  there 
was  but  one  head  like  that  in  the  world ! 

She  went  quickly  down  the  porch  to  the 
visitor,  and  when  there  was  not  more  than 
two  feet  between  them  she  had  had  time 
206 


THE    PRESENTIMENT 

to  undergo  her  sequence  of  emotions.  She  heard 
him  speak  to  her  and  she  gave  him  her  hand. 

"Hello,  John  Bennett !"  She  tried  to  laugh, 
and  found  that  she  couldn't  quite  make  it  as 
natural  as  she  wished  to.  "How  d'you  do; 
where  did  you  come  from  ?  Do  the  boys  know 
you're  here?  Whom  have  you  seen?" 

"Nobody.    I  came  out  here  to  wait." 

"Till  some  one  discovered  you?" 

"Yes,  till  you  did." 

She  could  laugh  now  and  had  her  voice  in 
hand.  This  was  the  happiness !  This  was  the 
prophecy !  This  was  what  had  come  with  her 
all  the  way  in  from  the  yacht ! 

"How  long  have  you  been  here?" 

"About  ten  minutes." 

"I've  been  riding,"  she  nodded.  "Do  you 
still  ride?" 

"I've  almost  lived  on  a  horse  for  two  years." 

"How  brown  you  are,  how  thin!  How  old 
you've  grown !  How  you've  changed !" 

She  was  aware  that  he  had  not  let  her  hand 
207 


FIRST    LOVE 

free.  She  drew  it  away  and  began  to  settle  her 
stiff  cravat  and  her  hair.  She  took  off  her  hat 
and  swung  it  on  her  arm.  She  bared  her  head 
without  coquetry,  knowing  that  around  the 
brows  there  were  little  touches  of  gray. 

"Do  you  know  I  haven't  heard  a  word  from 
you  in  two  years?" 

"Yes,"  he  answered,  "but  I've  brought  all 
that  mail  with  me.  I'll  read  it  to  you  some 
day!" 

"Tell  me  now.  ...  I  believe  you've  got 
some  secret  to  tell." 

She  was  taking  him  in  as  she  smiled  at  him, 
as  though  he  had  been  a  sailor  boy  just  home 
after  a  long  cruise ;  she  looked  at  him  as  though 
she  wanted  in  one  glance  to  read  in  his  sun- 
burned face  and  in  his  eyes  the  romances  of 
every  port. 

His  eyes  were  blue  as  the  sea,  and  a  perusal 

of  the  clear  bright  face  was  so  devoid  of  result, 

the  curve  of  his  beautiful  lips,  the  lines  of  his 

face   told  her  so   little,   that   she   exclaimed 

208 


THE    PRESENTIMENT 

humorously :  "I  believe  you've  been  in  prison, 
or  else  that  you're  married." 

Bennett  replied:  "I've  been  in  prison  all 
right,  although  it  was  a  big  open-air  one.  As 
the  boys  must  have  told  you,  if  you  cared  to 
ask,  I've  been  West  on  my  lemon  ranch  all  this 
time.  You  ought  to  know  my  partner;  he's  a 
winner,  Bob  Furniss,  from  Boston.  I  want  to 
tell  you  all  about  it,"  he  said  eagerly,  "from 
start  to  finish.  It's  such  a  bully  riding  coun- 
try— "  John  came  close  to  her.  "It's  been  a 
prison,  but,  though  I  could,  I  didn't  dare  come 
out  of  it.  I  never  rode  but  I  wanted  you  to  ride 
there  with  me;  I  never  took  a  breath  of  that 
splendid  air  but  I  wanted  you  to  breathe  it 
too." 

He  had  taken  both  her  hands  in  his  big 
tanned  hand,  with  the  rough  callouses  of  the 
reins  across  it.  Her  hand  seemed  to  sink  in  his 
like  snow  and  to  melt  there.  .  .  . 

"I  ran  away  like  a  coward  and  a  thief.  I 
didn't  want  you  to  forgive  me,  so  I  didn't 
209 


FIRST   LOVE 

write ;  but  all  these  months  I've  been  living  for 
-for—" 

He  didn't  know  how  to  press  his  advantage, 
he  was  too  new  in  love;  her  rising  color,  her 
frown  cut  his  words  short. 

"You'd  better  go  back  to  your  prison,  John 
Bennett,  and  to  your  ranch  as  soon  as  you 
can." 

But  as  he  set  her  hands  free  he  laughed  gaily, 
triumphantly,  and  the  note  of  joy  made  her 
tingle;  for  this  sound  had  every  element  of 
that  happiness  for  which  she  had  been  waiting 
all  day. 


210 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE  PRODIGAL 

DOCTOR  BRAINARD  was  taking  a  short 
vacation  at  his  farm  some  sixty  miles 
up-country.  There  had  been  much  typhoid 
in  Syracuse,  and  he  felt  the  long  siege  and  the 
close  battles  with  life  and  death,  and  he  was 
glad  to  get  away. 

He  loved  to  put  on  a  flannel  shirt  and  a 
straw  hat  and  make  hay  with  his  men.  It  was 
a  second  crop,  and  he  reveled  in  the  sunny 
August  atmosphere  and  in  the  peace  of  his 
short  vacation.  Cut  off  from  the  town  by 
telephone,  five  miles  from  the  post,  Doctor 
Brainard  used  to  say  that  he  ran  up  here  like 
a  coward  to  get  away  from  people  who  really 
needed  him. 

He  had  been  living  this  primitive  existence 
for  several  days,  smoking  a  pipe  or  a  good 
211 


FIRST    LOVE 

cigar  on  the  front  porch  of  the  rude  farm- 
house, and  going  to  bed  with  the  birds.  He 
took  no  medical  books  up  to  Home  Farm,  but 
vegetated  and  dreamed  at  his  ease  in  his  arm- 
chair in  his  little  parlor.  He  had  put  the  piano 
in  the  best  place  in  the  house.  He  liked  it 
better  up  here  in  the  country  than  he  did  in 
Syracuse.  At  Home  Farm  there  were  no  mem- 
ories to  jostle  it,  no  one  had  ever  been  out  here 
at  the  red  farm-house  who  could  make  him 
jealous  of  Mrs.  Bennett.  He  never  opened  the 
instrument;  it  stood  closed  just  as  he  had 
bought  it  on  the  day  of  the  auction.  But  on 
this  evening,  after  finishing  his  cigar,  he  got 
out  the  key  and  unlocked  the  case  and  stood 
for  some  time  looking  down  at  the  keys  until 
they  blurred  before  his  eyes. 

The  hay  had  been  cut  that  afternoon  and 
the  perfume  came  in  sweet  and  warm,  redolent 
with  clover,  and  across  the  shorn  meadows  he 
heard  the  men  and  women  laugh  and  call,  going 
home. 

212 


THE    PRODIGAL 

The  childless  bachelor  had  done  his  best  for 
the  son  of  the  woman  he  had  faithfully  loved 
all  his  life.  Standing  by  the  open  piano,  he 
waited  now  for  the  young  man  to  arrive.  The 
buggy  had  gone  "over  town"  to  fetch  him,  for 
a  day  or  two  before  John  had  wired  that  he 
wanted  to  come  out  and  make  a  visit  at  the 
farm. 

The  doctor's  personal  reveries  had  been 
agreeable,  but  he  didn't  follow  them  on,  but 
gave  himself  up  to  thinking  about  John,  whom 
he  hadn't  seen  for  two  years;  and  since  John 
had  come  suddenly  East  he  had  written  the 
doctor  only  once,  to  ask  him  for  a  considerable 
loan  of  money.  This  was  only  the  other  day, 
and  John  had  been  East  some  six  weeks. 

From  where  the  doctor  stood  he  could  see 
the  road  wind  across  the  flat  country  between 
the  harvested  fields,  and  caught  sight  of  the 
buggy  bringing  John  from  the  station,  as  it 
first  declared  itself  a  speck,  and  then  growing 
larger,  finally  rattled  in  at  the  gate  and  drew 
213 


FIRST    LOVE 

up  by  the  barn.  The  young  fellow  got  out, 
bigger,  more  tremendous  than  ever,  and  Doctor 
Brainard,  who  was  a  small  man,  felt  over- 
powered. 

"Hello,  Doctor,"  the  visitor  wrung  his 
friend's  hand  hard.  "Lord,  but  it's  good  to 
smell  that  hay!  And  isn't  it  a  bully  evening?" 

After  supper,  when  he  had  wandered  over 
the  farm,  seen  the  live  stock,  had  the  horses 
he  liked  best  led  out  and  looked  over,  when  the 
doctor  had  observed  him  furtively,  looked  him 
over  and  made  a  mental  note  of  "decided 
nervous  excitement"  taken  in  his  embarrassed 
nonchalance,  his  altered  ways,  his  undoubted 
manhood,  the  two  went  together  to  the  par- 
lor, where  candles  had  been  put  on  the  open 
piano  and  where  the  servant  had  placed  a 
mass  of  sweet  peas  in  a  bowl. 

"Sit  there,"  the  older  man  ordered,  as  he 
might  have  told  John  to  do  when  he  was  a  boy 
and  home  on  his  vacation.  He  made  him  sit 
214 


THE    PRODIGAL 

with  his  red  head  and  his  handsome  young  face 
against  the  light. 

"Well,"  said  the  doctor  pleasantly,  "you 
came  East  suddenly,  didn't  you?  But  you're 
doing  well  on  the  ranch?" 

"Pretty  well." 

"How  did  you  leave  things  there?" 

"Pretty  good  shape." 

The  curt  sentences  did  not  frighten  Doctor 
Brainard. 

"But  you  didn't  think  the  venture  was  all 
that  you  expected  ?  What  was  the  matter?" 

"It  isn't  the  ranch  that  eats  up  things.  I 
wanted  this  advance  that  I  asked  you  for  for 
myself." 

The  young  man  sat  on  the  window-ledge,  his 
hands  around  his  knee.  His  friend  remem- 
bered the  spendthrift  gentleman  of  whom  this 
was  the  son,  and  wondered  how  the  boy's 
father  would  approach  this  affair  of  extrava- 
gance. 

The  doctor  cleared  his  throat.  "You  know 
215 


FIRST   LOVE 

you  haven't  got  an  income  to  stand  the  strain 
you're  putting  on  it." 

"I'm  much  obliged  for  the  loan,  sir,"  said 
John  evasively. 

"You've  been  going  the  pace,  I  guess,"  but 
the  doctor  smiled  so  affably  as  he  said  the 
words  that  his  hearer  accepted  them  agreeably, 
and  returned:  "Well,  I've  been  running  on 
pretty  well,  Doctor." 

"What  is  it,  my  boy?    Cards?" 

John  hesitated. 

"Oh — little  of  everything!  I've  played  a 
lot  of  bridge,  I've  bought  some  horses,  and  it 
costs  to  live." 

"It  costs  me"  his  friend  replied,  "just  four 
thousand  dollars  a  year  to  run  the  farm  and 
my  town  house;  it  cost  your  father  thirty  to 
forty  thousand,  and  he  died  a  hundred  thou- 
sand in  debt.  I  hoped  very  much  that  you  had 
set  out  on  a  different  plan.  But  not  to  seem 
to  preach  to  you,  for  after  all  I'm  nothing  but 
a  friend,  does  this  loan  clear  up  things?" 
216 


THE    PRODIGAL 

"Not  by  ten  thousand  dollars." 

And  here  the  young  man  got  up  and  went 
out  of  the  room  as  if  to  avoid  the  doctor's 
exclamation. 

He  leaned  against  one  of  the  piazza,  posts, 
where  the  honeysuckle  vine  wound  its  green 
leaves  and  hung  its  yellow  bugles.  As  though 
nothing  had  broken  into  their  conversation  of 
a  few  moments  since,  when  Brainard  finally 
came  out,  John  said : 

"I've  been  using  my  capital  right  along  till 
now.  I  haven't  got  anything  left  but  the 
ranch." 

The  older  man,  who  had  been  mowing  all 
afternoon  with  his  men  in  the  hay-fields  and 
had  felt  only  a  delicious  weariness,  now  experi- 
enced a  sense  of  burden,  a  great  fatigue  crept 
over  him. 

John,  by  the  honeysuckle  vine  close  to  the 
post  of  the  porch,  straight  and  vigorous,  did 
not  carry  any  perceptible  burden,  for  it  ap- 
peared to  have  shifted  over  to  the  older  shoul- 
217 


FIRST    LOVE 

ders,  and  when  the  doctor  spoke  again  his  voice 
was  keen. 

"I  suppose  that  I  don't  understand  the  set  of 
people  you've  been  going  with.  Gamblers  filch 
you  at  their  own  tables,  that's  accepted.  But 
these  people  whose  incomes  are  limitless  let  a 
poor  young  fellow  like  you  go  along  with  them, 
share  their  extravagance — " 

John  turned  sharply :  "For  God's  sake,"  he 
exclaimed,  "drop  it,  Doctor.  They  haven't  any- 
thing to  do  with  my  extravagance;  it's  none 
of  their  business  what  I  spend,  and  if  I  want 
to  go  with  them,  it's  my  own  affair.  Jack 
Bathurst  asked  me  to  go  on  a  yachting  trip  of 
his  as  his  guest — they  had  to  charter  a  new 
boat,  as  theirs  is  being  overhauled — and  I  in- 
sisted on  sharing  the  expenses." 

The  doctor  stared  at  him ;  he  took  his  glasses 
off. 

"My  word!"  he  exclaimed.  "Why,  it  doesn't 
cost  less  than  fifteen  thousand  to  run  such  a 
yacht  for  a  few  months." 
'  218 


THE    PRODIGAL 

"Just  about  that,"  said  the  young  man  mag- 
nificently. 

"A  seventh  of  your  fortune." 

"Yes." 

And  this  time  the  doctor  turned  and  walked 
into  the  house. 

The  magnificent  prodigal,  with  more  or  less 
serenity,  smoked  by  the  honeysuckle  vine,  then 
went  down  the  path  to  the  kitchen  garden  and 
across  the  fields  to  the  spring-house.  He  had 
especially  loved  this  corner  as  a  boy.  Cool 
and  deep  and  vocal  and  delicious,  the  caressing 
gurgle  over  the  stones  of  a  shallow  brook 
caught  his  ear  and  gave  him  the  same  old  thrill. 
With  its  borders  of  cress  and  of  spearmint 
holding  it  round  like  a  bouquet,  the  pool  settled 
and  made  its  icy  bowl.  Across  its  limited  sur- 
face John  saw  the  moonlight  drift,  and  while 
he  stood  there  the  harvest  moon,  yellow  as  but- 
ter, golden  as  a  metal  globe,  hung  over  Home 
Farm. 

John  sat  down  on  the  grass,  the  farm-house, 
219 


FIRST    LOVE 

warm  and  secure,  back  of  him,  the  pool  at  his 
feet  He  didn't  think  at  all  about  the  doctor, 
whom  he  had  pained  and  shocked  and  troubled ; 
to  his  own  tangled  affairs  he  didn't  give  a 
second  of  thought.  Above  his  young  head  the 
moon  seemed  to  spin  in  the  heavens,  a  bird 
called  clear  in  the  small  forest  at  his  hand, 
where  he  had  hunted  as  a  boy  and  dreamed  of 
jungles.  He  drew  his  breath  with  delight  at 
these  happy  memories.  It  would  be  the  hunt- 
ers' moon  the  following  month,  and  he  would 
hunt  with  her,  not  forty  miles  away.  This 
time  he  wouldn't  follow  the  scarlet  coat  as  he 
had  done  before,  like  a  timid  and  suffering  fool 
• — he  would  know  better  how  to  live. 

Memories  of  the  yachting  trip,  just  over, 
came  hard  and  fast  on  him — heavenly  days  and 
nights  as  beautiful  as  this — and  he  kept  his 
recollections  company  until  he  realized  that  he 
was  sitting  there  alone  in  the  grass,  and  he 
sprang  up  with  something  like  a  cry  of  pain. 

As  he  came  back  lazily  toward  the  house,  he 
220 


THE    PRODIGAL 

heard  some  one  playing  at  the  piano.  There 
was  no  one  there  when  he  came  in,  though  the 
candles  burned  in  their  sticks  and  a  sheet  of 
open  music  stood  on  the  rack.  John  didn't 
know  that  Doctor  Brainard  played. 

The  sheet  of  music  read,  "From  Alfred 
Brainard  to  Mary  Poole."  Why,  that  was  his 
mother's  name  and  this  had  been  her  piano! 
He  remarked  it  for  the  first  time  and  remem- 
bered that  Doctor  Brainard  had  bought  it  at 
the  sale. 

He  stood  before  the  old  rosewood,  laid  his 
hand  caressingly  on  the  stained  keys  and  for 
the  first  time  thought  of  his  mother  with  ten- 
derness; his  love  for  another  woman  made 
him  now  approach  all  women  in  his  mind  with 
the  worship  of  a  lover.  The  song  on  the  rack 
was  the  one  his  partner  at  Chiluvista  had  ever- 
lastingly been  humming. 

"Believe  me,  if  all  those  endearing  young 
charms." 


221 


FIRST   LOVE 

John  began  very  softly  to  play  the  opening 
chords.  He  fingered  the  page  through.  With 
the  last  note  Doctor  Brainard  came  back,  look- 
ing tired  and  pale. 

"I  guess  we  ought  to  be  saying  good  night," 
Bennett  said  with  compunction.  "These  aren't 
farm  hours,  are  they,  Doctor  ?" 

"I've  been  haying  to-day  and  I'm  stiff  as  a 
poker.  Your  old  room  is  all  ready  and  the 
lamp  is  lighted.  There  are  screens  in  the  win- 
dow and  you'd  better  keep  them  down.  If 
you'll  put  your  clothes  and  boots  out  on  a  chair, 
the  girl  will  brush  them  for  you." 

Doctor  Brainard  took  his  guest  in  from  his 
boots  to  his  bright  head. 

"You  kicked  the  footboard  out  of  your  bed 
the  last  time  you  slept  there,  John !  We  never 
put  it  back,  so  I  guess  you'll  have  length 
enough.  Good  night." 

The  guest,  bending  his  tall  head  under  the 
low  door,  went  out;  the  doctor  closed  the 
piano,  folded  up  the  song,  and  locked  the  in- 
222 


I   guess  we  ought  to  be   saying  good-night."     Page  222 


THE    PRODIGAL 

strument.  He  was  a  sentimentalist.  There 
had  been  quite  enough  sacrilege  on  this  night. 

Just  before  his  ward  came  in  the  doctor  had 
surprised  his  servant  girl  with  her  hands  on 
the  keys,  picking  out  a  tune;  and  now  John 
had  played  his  mother's  song  through. 

The  doctor  shut  the  window  and  bolted  it, 
closed  the  front  door  and  locked  it,  and  went 
up-stairs  to  bed. 


223 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  RECKONING 

JOHN  stayed  ten  days  at  Home  Farm,  and 
Doctor  Brainard  left  him  to  his  own  de- 
vices. Every  morning  the  hired  man  took  the 
post  in  and  carried  with  him  a  bulky  letter, 
written  by  the  young  lover.  It  had  been  easy, 
so  fascinatingly  easy  to  cover  page  after  page. 
In  older  days,  in  colder  days,  how  Bennett 
envied  the  power  and  force  that  created  those 
words,  how  he  yearned  for  it  and  with  what 
jealous  regret !  He  could  have  written  all  day 
long.  Instead,  he  took  his  passion  out  of  doors 
and  walked  with  it,  its  magnificent  sunny  pres- 
ence like  an  angel  at  his  side. 

He  lay  under  the  haystacks  and  read  and 
planned,  and  even  began  to  rhyme  and  to  make 
verses.     Everything  that  made  him  think  of 
224 


THE    RECKONING 

his  finances  he  thrust  away  with  irritation;  he 
wouldn't  open  Furniss'  letters,  and  they  lay 
on  his  table  with  his  bills.  During  the  ten  days 
at  Home  Farm  he  never  had  one  letter  from 
Mrs.  Bathurst.  But  then,  he  hadn't  dared 
hope  she  would  write  to  him;  in  a  few  days 
the  whole  Bathurst  family  would  be  in  Talla- 
hoe,  and  he  was  booked  to  visit  there. 

The  present  John  Bennett  was  very  much 
warped;  he  was  out  of  line  with  part  of  his 
nature  and  in  perfect  step  with  the  sentimental 
part.  No  young  man  in  love  is  ever  balanced. 
The  lunacy  of  love  and  its  delirium  all  be- 
longed to  him  now,  and  there  wasn't  an  object 
on  any  part  of  the  globe  that  didn't  revolve 
under  the  sun  of  one  woman's  face;  every- 
thing else  was  in  the  dark.  To  John  there  was 
but  one  pole,  the  universe  hung  loose  from  it. 

During  the  ten  days  of  his  ward's  stay  Doc- 
tor Brainard  found  that  he  had  a  very  acute 
case  to  study.  He  found  himself  saying  once, 
"Thank  God,  he's  not  my  own  son !"  After  he 
225 


FIRST    LOVE 

had  said  this  he  discovered  he  didn't  feel  any 
the  less  badly  for  the  assertion. 

Bennett  delighted  in  doing  over  all  the  things 
he  had  done  at  Home  Farm  when  he  was  a 
boy. 

Coming  in  from  a  long  day's  fishing  up- 
stream, his  big  boots  high  on  his  thighs,  his 
rod  hanging  over  his  shoulder,  a  flapping 
straw  hat  on  his  red  head,  he  gave  his  straw 
basket  to  the  hired  girl,  who  would  have  cooked 
a  whale  for  him  if  he  had  brought  it  in,  and  sat 
down  on  the  porch  like  a  farmer's  lad.  The 
doctor,  not  quite  so  limber  as  his  ward,  sat 
down  more  stiffly  on  the  low  step. 

When  they  had  both  lighted  their  pipes, 
Brainard  asked  John :  "What  are  you  going 
to  do?" 

The  young  man  turned;  his  face  had  the 
look  of  the  morning  on  it,  there  wasn't  a  line 
of  care.  As  he  looked  then,  some  young  god 
might  have  looked  just  before  he  went  to  his 
mistress. 

226 


THE    RECKONING 

"Going  to  run  down  to  New  York  to-mor- 
row for  a  few  days,  then  I  guess  I'll  go  on  over 
to  the  Valley ;  I'm  asked  to  stay  there  in  several 
places." 

"I  meant  what  are  you  going  to  do  about 
your  business  affairs?" 

A  slight  wrinkle  came  over  John's  brow. 
Until  he  found  that  he  hadn't  another  dollar 
in  his  pocket  he  would  go  on  still  hoping  that 
he  might  discover  some  bunch  of  unlooked-for 
greenbacks  in  his  top  drawer. 

"Guess  I'll  have  to  sell  out  to  Furniss."  He 
serenely  accepted  his  fate. 

After  a  slight  pause  the  doctor  said  medita- 
tively, "I  .remember  the  time  when  you  wanted 
to  hire  out  as  an  errand  boy  at  Hickson's. 
And  for  a  first-rate  reason,"  the  doctor  went 
on.  "You  had  a  sort  of  fine  pride ;  you  didn't 
want  to  be  patronized.  Your  father  was  a 
spendthrift,  he  spent  his  money  like  a  prince, 
but  for  some  reason  or"  other  he  always  seemed 
to  be  acting  the  host." 

227 


FIRST    LOVE 

His  auditor  stirred  uneasily,  and  then  asked : 
"Do  you  mean  that  you  think  I  sponge?" 

The  doctor  found  that  he  was  as  sensitive  as 
a  woman  before  his  task. 

"To  go  about  with  millionaires  everywhere 
takes  a  large  income.  You  have  a  very  small 
one."  He  looked  down  at  the  young  fellow's 
feet.  John  had  drawn  off  his  big  boots.  "Those 
stockings,"  Brainard  thought  himself  very 
keen,  "didn't  cost  you  a  cent  less  than  two  dol- 
lars a  pair." 

Bennett's  conscience  gave  him  a  twinge. 
They  had  cost  him  six  dollars,  and  he  had  a 
dozen  or  more  pairs  of  them. 

"And  I  dare  say,"  the  doctor  went  on,  "that 
your  general  expenses  are  about  on  the  same 
scale.  We're  both  men  here  together,  and  I 
wasn't  born  yesterday,  if  I  am  an  old  bachelor." 

The  brightness  died  out  of  John's  face. 

"Have  you  your  bills  with  you  ?" 

"The  whole  bunch."  And  he  remembered 
the  day  when  at  school  he  had  carried  in  his 
228 


THE    RECKONING 

pocket  the  florist's  bill  and  his  tailor's  bill,  and 
how  the  doctor  had  come  suddenly  to  tell  him 
about  his  inheritance. 

"Money  certainly  is  the  deuce,"  John  mur- 
mured, and  he  took  his  pipe  out  of  his  mouth 
and  looked  at  it  hopelessly,  as  if  his  own 
fortunes  were  contained  in  the  little  bowl. 

"In  a  lump  sum,  how  much  do  you  owe, 
John?" 

Bennett  told  him. 

"How  much  have  you  left  of  your  capital?" 

The  young  man  cleared  his  throat,  took  a 
whiff  at  his  pipe,  which  had  gone  out.  He 
turned  about  and  laughed. 

His  friend's  pipe  was  still  red,  and  the  doctor 
smoked  in  the  lingering  sunlight,  his  eyes  on 
the  peaceful  fields.  The  man  washed  the  buggy 
in  front  of  the  barn  door;  the  water  splashed 
on  the  whirring  wheels ;  John's  fish  was  frying 
in  the  kitchen,  and  the  odor  of  soda  biscuit 
browning  in  the  oven,  came  out,  fragrant  and 
tempting. 

229 


FIRST    LOVE 

"The  ranch,"  Bennett  said— "that  is,  my 
share  of  it — will  more  than  pay  up  everything 
I  owe  you,  Doctor  Brainard." 

"I  dare  say.  I  expect  it's  a  little  too  soon  to 
ask  you  what  you've  got  out  of  all  this  sort 
of  thing." 

"Lord,"  John  tried  to  face  the  music.  "A 
fellow  has  got  to  live,  a  man  must  see  the 
world." 

"Costs  a  great  deal  to  go  around  it,"  said 
the  doctor.  "There  have  been  men  who  thought 
they  had  done  it  in  eighty  days.  I'm  twice 
your  age,  and  I  don't  pretend  to  have  seen 
much  more  than  Home  Farm." 

His  eyes  grew  small  under  his  heavy  brows ; 
he  could  not  but  think  as  he  spoke  of  how 
complete  the  world  would  have  been  right  here 
—if—! 

Mary  Poole's  son  got  up,  and  with  a  good 

deal  of  dignity  for  one  who  had  nearly  ruined 

himself  and  borrowed  money,  he  said:     "It 

doesn't  make  so  much  difference  what  I've  got 

230 


THE    RECKONING 

out  of  it  just  now,  Doctor,  does  it  ?    I'm  only 
twenty-six." 

"No,"  returned  the  older  man  slowly,  "you 
can't,  of  course,  weigh  everything  against 
money." 

The  physician  knew  very  well  the  set  in 
which  his  ward  had  been  seeing  life;  most  of 
the  people  were  his  own  patients,  some  of  the 
men  were  inebriates,  most  of  the  women  had 
nerves.  "Have  some  of  my  tobacco."  He  held 
out  his  pouch. 

The  young  man  filled  up  and  lighted  his 
brierwood. 

"Do  you  know  any  real  nice  girl  you  could 
marry?" 

His  ward  roared.  "Marry !  I'm  never  going 
to  marry,  Doctor.  I  wouldn't  marry  the  best 
girl  alive." 

"I  thought  not,"  replied  Doctor  Brainard 
quietly.     "But  if  you'll  marry  some  good  girl 
within  a  year,  I'll  put  the  ranch  back,  pay  your 
debts,  and  start  you  fresh." 
231 


FIRST   LOVE 

"You're  awfully  kind,"  exclaimed  Bennett 
heartily;  "but  if  that's  the  alternative  I  guess 
I'll  have  to  sink  or  swim  alone,  for  I  can't  meet 
you." 

The  shadow  on  John's  face  deepened,  for 
with  the  alternative,  even  Home  Farm,  where 
he  had  buried  his  soul  these  last  days,  became 
like  a  "bird's  nest  filled  with  snow;"  he  couldn't 
return  to  it  as  he  had  done  any  more. 

He  glanced  up  at  the  doctor,  who  appeared 
thoroughly  to  enjoy  his  pipe  and  had  the  air 
of  a  man  fully  satisfied  with  his  own  point  of 
view,  and,  after  a  little,  he  said:  "I  know 
marriage  doesn't  need  me  to  plead  for  it — an 
old  bachelor's  views  on  the  subject  aren't 
worth  much.  But  there  is  such  a  thing,  John, 
as  filling  your  mouth  with  ashes  and  thinking 
it's  honey.  There  is  such  a  thing  as  planting 
your  garden  beds  full  of  sterile  weeds.  .  .  . 
I  see  that  James  has  begun  to  graft  the  bushes 
down  there  by  the  south  fence,  and  I  want  to 
go  over  and  look  at  the  trees."  He  rose  slowly. 
232 


THE    RECKONING 

"I  shall  wire  Bob  Furniss  to-night,"  Bennett 
said,  "to  sell  out  my  share  of  the  ranch/' 

"And  with  what's  left,"  said  Doctor  Brain- 
ard,  "after  you've  paid  up  your  debts,  I  suppose 
you'll  go  round  the  world  again." 

And  the  young  fellow  half-heartedly  re- 
turned his  smile :  "I  guess  that's  about  right, 
Doctor!" 


233 


CHAPTER  XIX 

THE  SUSPICION 

VIRGINIA  BATHURST,  in  her  riding- 
habit,  coming  from  the  stables,  the  dogs 
at  her  heels,  felt  herself  not  more  than  "sweet 
and  twenty,"  and  looked  it  too,  for,  touched 
by  one  of  those  rare  auroras  which  now  and 
then  give  to  a  woman  the  semblance  of  a  false 
dawn — her  step  and  her  laugh,  her  gestures  of 
happiness  as  she  played  with  her  dogs,  the  song 
she  hummed  as  she  went  into  the  house,  were 
all  buoyant.  She  was  expecting  a  visitor,  and 
the  room  was  lighted  by  the  warmest  of  lamps. 
Hesitating  whether  or  not  she  would  go 
up-stairs  to  dress  or  stop  where  she  was,  she 
finally  decided  on  the  latter  course,  and  went 
into  one  of  the  smaller  rooms,  where  a  big  fire 
lighted  on  the  hearth  was  the  only  sound  likely 
to  disturb  her. 

234 


THE   SUSPICION 

She  was  alone  at  Bathurst  House  for  the 
time  with  Grace  Cornwallis,  now  Mrs.  Peter 
Bathurst,  Junior,  and  Grace's  baby.  Peter, 
Senior,  and  his  sons  were  in  Saratoga  for  the 
races,  and  the  lady  of  her  house  was  left  to  her 
own  devices,  wanderings,  and  ridings ;  she  had 
gone  pretty  well  over  the  country.  It  had 
been  with  relief  that  she  had  seen  them  all 
leave  Tallahoe,  for  she  wanted  to  be  alone  and 
to  pursue  her  thoughts  from  under  her  hus- 
band's eyes.  Daily  she  had  reviewed  the  lands 
of  memory  as  she  had  gone  daily  over  the 
Tallahoe  country,  where  now  and  then  she 
would  bring  her  horse  up  short  at  a  perilous 
jump — so  she  would  bring  her  thoughts  up 
short  at  the  one  perilous  place.  She  knew  how 
great  the  danger  was  there,  though  some- 
times she  would  deny  it  and  ride  straight  and 
free;  then  again  she  would  confess  that  it 
was  a  fatal  danger,  and  if  she  should  go  on 
would  mean  some  kind  of  death. 

She  knew  that  she  loved  John  Bennett,  boy 
235 


FIRST   LOVE 

as  he  was,  young  as  he  was — and  that  her  de- 
frauded heart,  which  had  experienced  many 
disappointments,  found  in  this  man's  love  and 
being,  solace  and  beauty,  and  that  she  could 
there  find  happiness. 

She  accepted  the  fact  as  it  was,  she  acknowl- 
edged it  frankly  and  she  was  great  in  the  way 
she  faced  it;  but  until  this  afternoon  here  at 
Tallahoe,  when  he  was  coming  back  to  her, 
she  had  not  been  quite  able  to  decide  what  she 
was  going  to  do  with  him. 

His  adoration  and  passion,  the  security  in 
the  fact  that  he  had  never  and  probably  would 
never  love  again  as  he  did  now,  gave  her 
strength  to  be  mistress  of  herself;  she  felt 
there  wasn't  any  hurry  about  the  climax,  if 
there  was  to  be  one,  and  she  knew  that  with 
her  experience  she  held  him,  and  that  it  was 
for  her  to  do  what  she  liked — she  knew  that 
he  was  hers.  She  understood  in  a  measure  the 
pilgrimage  he  made  to  her,  how  he  had  come 
to  her  shrine ;  she  understood  that  for  the  time 
236 


THE    SUSPICION 

she  was  a  sacred  thing  to  him;  he  was  young 
and  clean-eyed,  passionate  and  manly,  and  she 
knew  that  she  was  for  the  present  all  women  to 
him  and  that  she  would  remain  throughout  his 
life  as  the  one  woman;  according  to  the  way 
she  should  manage  this  situation,  his  ideals,  his 
happiness  or  his  miseries  would  take  form  and 
date  from  her. 

Virginia  understood  that  she  need  not  fear 
a  rival;  for  a  long  time  she  would  be  safe  in 
the  little  kingdom  he  gave  her;  whether  she 
should  decide  to  become  its  queen — or  to  re- 
main its  goddess — it  wouldn't  for  the  present 
make  any  difference  to  this  ardent  lover;  it 
was  her  own  ground,  her  own  realm. 

It  was  difficult  to  feel  that  the  very  most 
common-sense  course,  the  wisest  course,  was  to 
wreck  this  kingdom  in  John's  eyes,  and  it 
hadn't  been  possible  yet  for  her  to  take  de- 
cision, to  think  very  clearly;  she  was  far  too 
conscious  of  herself,  far  too  much  a  prey  to 
her  own  self  in  it.  She  didn't  know — she 
237 


FIRST   LOVE 

couldn't  tell — what  she  would  be  "good 
enough" — she  put  it — "to  do." 

She  had  forbidden  him  to  speak  to  her  of 
love — she  had  told  him  that  the  day  he  dis- 
obeyed her  she  would  never  see  him  again, 
laughing  in  her  heart  at  his  white  face  and  his 
obedience,  conscious  how  unable  she  would  be 
to  keep  that  threat!  But  poor  John  took  her 
at  her  word  and  accepted  the  silence  she  forced, 
only  because  he  believed  her  and  wanted  above 
all  other  things  to  be  near  to  her. 

In  Newport  he  had  attached  himself  to  the 
worldly  skirts  of  their  set,  and,  as  poor  Doctor 
Brainard  had  known,  followed  like  a  pauper 
prince,  and  the  pace  was  beyond  his  means. 

He  had  seen,  nevertheless,  little  of  the 
woman  for  whom  he  was  wasting  his  youth 
until  he  went  away  with  them  all  on  the  yacht- 
ing trip;  it  had  been  conceived  to  give  Jack 
a  chance  to  carry  off  the  girl  he  was  trying  to 
win;  he  had  chartered  a  yacht  of  his  own  for 
the  party  of  butterflies  who  had  flown  off  into 
238 


THE   SUSPICION 

something  like  a  midsummer  dream  with  Vir- 
ginia for  chaperone  and  Cynthia  Forsythe  as 
the  goal. 

The  congressman,  Peter  Bathurst,  Senior, 
hors  de  combat  from  the  very  first  day,  con- 
fined himself  with  his  cocktails  to  his  own 
quarters,  and  John  Bennett  had  had  the  field 
for  his  own.  During  those  summer  days  when 
the  warm  waters  curled  like  azure  under  the 
keel — when  sky  and  clouds  seemed  made  of 
witchcraft  and  the  boat  in  which  they  sailed 
to  be  a  ship  of  dreams,  the  young  man  had  sat 
by  Virginia's  side,  read  to  her,  watched  the  re- 
flections in  her  eyes,  basked  under  the  tranquil 
beauty  of  her  face,  sunned  himself  in  the  sun 
of  her,  and  longed  to  spend  his  whole  existence 
in  one  kiss  on  her  lips,  which  seemed  to  him 
to  be  the  most  perfect  way  in  which  he  could 
offer  her  his  soul. 

He  listened  to  her,  existed  for  her,  drank 
her,  ate  her,  lived  her  until  it  was  as  though 
his  very  heart  became  the  ship  itself,  and  she 
239 


FIRST    LOVE 

rested  on  it  and  he  seemed  to  carry  the  burden 
of  her  over  every  wave. 

Because  she  had  never  flirted  with  him,  as 
he  knew  the  word  to  mean,  because  she  had 
never  once  met  the  passion  in  his  eyes  by  a 
passion  in  her  own,  he  had  never  felt  assuaged 
or  much  encouraged. 

She  never  gave  him  permission  to  speak,  and 
there  was  something  about  the  way  she  treated 
him  and  her  own  attitude  that  kept  him  from 
a  violent  outburst.  Even  in  the  nights  when 
they  sat  side  by  side  on  the  deck,  under  the 
planets  that  swam  above  them  in  the  heavens, 
she  never  so  much  as  drew  him  to  touch  her, 
and  John  grew  to  worship  her  as  well  as  to 
love  her,  and  she  became  as  sacred  to  him  as 
she  was  desired.  His  case  was  hopeless  and 
for  his  emotion  and  his  ecstasy  there  was  only 
one  possible  cure. 

Virginia,  as  she  waited  for  him,  had  chosen 
a  big  leather  chair  and  seated  herself  in  it, 
turning  her  back  to  the  room  and  her  face  to 
240 


THE    SUSPICION 

the  fire.  She  had  been  in  riding  dress  when 
John  found  her  on  the  porch  at  Newport,  and 
she  knew  how  much  he  liked  to  see  her  so. 
He  would  come  in  an  hour,  and  she  would 
remain  as  she  was  to  receive  him. 

If  she  had  chosen,  she  might  have  taken 
sincere  satisfaction  in  contemplating  the  ways 
she  had  conducted  herself  with  this  young  man 
in  love.  She  had  certainly  been  irreproach- 
able; but  she  did  not  commend  herself. 

"As  far  as  that  goes,"  she  thought,  "I  really 
ought  never  to  have  seen  him  again  after  the 
way  he  went  on  here.  But  as  it  now  stands — 
as  it  now  stands — Heaven  knows — Heaven 
only  knows." 

Grace  Bathurst  came  in  with  her  child  in 
her  arms. 

"Don't  you,"  she  asked,  "want  to  look  after 
the  boy  for  a  second,  Virginia  ?  1  must  answer 
a  telephone  call."  And  she  put  the  blond  child 
down  in  the  lap  of  the  woman  in  the  big  chair. 
The  little  thing  leaned  his  curls  against  Mrs. 
241 


FIRST    LOVE 

Bathurst's  breast  and  looked  up  at  her  with 
humid  eyes.  She  bent  over  him,  her  slender 
hands  with  their  sparkling  rings  caressed  his 
baby  head  as  she  bent  her  head,  and  the  fire- 
light played  on  the  dark  and  on  the  golden 
hair.  It  delighted  her  that  she  could  not,  be- 
cause of  her  age,  have  been  the  mother  of  Jack 
or  Peter,  nor  even  of  Mrs.  Peter,  Junior,  and 
that  this  was  not  her  step-grandchild  except  by 
courtesy. 

She  thought  these  things  as  she  bent  over  the 
child. 

"To-day,"  she  was  saying  to  herself,  "to-day 
he  will  be  here — soon — and  I'm  almost  sorry, 
for  I  never  wanted  so  much  to  see  him  as  to- 
day .  .  .  it's  not  well  for  him  to  come  while 
I'm  so  happy." 

He  had  written  her  from  Doctor  Brainard's 
farm  every  day  for  a  fortnight,  and  she  had 
laughed  over  his  letters  and  she  had  cried  over 
them;  hot,  hasty,  voluminous — a  word  mis- 
spelled here,  here  and  there  blotted  with  the 
242 


THE    SUSPICION 

lover's  haste,  and  there  was  not  one  page  which 
did  not  bear  the  fire  and  beauty  of  passion. 
These  were  the  things  that  brought  heaven 
down  to  earth,  or  rather,  lifted  the  dreary  earth 
to  the  skies. 

Nicholas  Pyrnne  wrote  to  her,  too. 

She  had  not  seen  her  old  friend  since  the  day 
he  had  left  her,  two  years  or  more  ago.  He 
had  told  her  then  that  when  she  wanted  him 
she  was  to  send  for  him.  Poor,  poor,  dear 
man!  But  every  week,  faithfully,  he  wrote 
her — charming  letters,  full  of  the  topics  of  the 
day :  clever,  witty,  a  little  malicious,  masculine, 
and  discreet;  but  how  dry  and  cold  they  read 
beside  those  other  letters  from  Home  Farm,  in 
their  big  envelopes,  many  of  them  without  be- 
ginning or  end !  John's  letters  had  made  her 
young  again,  made  her  press  them  to  her  lips 
as  though  they  had  been  screens  to  shield  her 
face  from  herself.  In  them  the  boy  had  told 
her  everything  she  had  forbidden  him  to  say — 
he  had  told  her  without  stint  or  fear:  in  them 

243 


FIRST   LOVE 

he  had  been  a  man  at  last,  and  she  saw  what 
a  real  man  he  was,  what  a  dear,  deep  and  tender 
man  he  was  and  what  a  heart  he  had  and  how 
he  was  hers.  John  wrote  of  himself  till  his 
ranch  life  lived  for  her,  he  made  Home  Farm 
a  rural  poem,  until,  reading,  she  had  closed 
her  eyes  and  wandered  through  the  meadows 
with  him  as  though  they  had  been  boy  and  girl. 

Ah — that  was  it,  boy  and  girl!  Oh,  why 
couldn't  they  be,  why?  For  why  must  he 
bring  all  this  richness  to  a  woman  bound  and 
chained  as  she  was  bound  and  chained;  bound 
fast  as  death,  bound  to  a  man  who  loved  her 
although  she  hated  him;  and  as  for  her  girl- 
hood, already  it  was  too  far  behind. 

"Come,  baby,"  Grace  put  out  her  hands  to 
her  child;  "come,  darling." 

She  knelt  on  the  floor  before  Virginia  and 
the  child.  "Come,  Jacky — he  won't  leave  you, 
Virginia — aren't  you  proud?  Who  do  you 
think  just  telephoned  me,  fancy,  from  the 
Washingtons',  over  on  the  hill  ?  Cynthia,  she's 
244 


THE   SUSPICION 

over  there  with  them.  Isn't  it  bully  ?  It's  just 
two  years,  you  know,  since  we  were  all  here 
together,  Virginia.  It's  a  reunion,  isn't  it? 
You  remember  how  awfully  in  love  Cynnie  was 
with  John,  don't  you?  And  now  I've  got  a 
piece  of  news  to  tell  you.  She'll  want  to  tell  you 
herself,  but  I'm  going  to  get  ahead  of  her,  for 
she  didn't  forbid  me.  It's  all  right  between 
Jack  and  Cynthia,  but  I  suppose  you  really 
know." 

Virginia's  face  reddened,  and  she  hid  it  by 
the  head  of  the  child.  "I'm  not  surprised,"  she 
said;,  "I  almost  knew  it.  It  will  be  a  piece 
of  news  to  tell  John."  And  then  for  the  first 
time  she  gave  her  stepdaughter  the  informa- 
tion that  John  Bennett  was  coming  that  very 
night. 

"I  had  a  telephone  from  him  some  time 
ago,"  she  said  with  what  ease  she  could.  She 
was  embarrassed  under  the  younger  woman's 
frank  gaze.  "He's  going  to  make  a  visit  or 
two  in  the  Valley  and  will  begin  here  with  us." 
245 


FIRST    LOVE 

"Oh !"  Mrs.  Peter  answered  rather  vaguely, 
"here,  in  his  old  hunting-ground,  isn't  it?" 

And  the  hostess  repeated:  "Yes,  his  old 
hunting-ground." 

Mrs.  Peter  took  her  child  and  went  over  to 
the  window  and  stood  there  patting  the  pane 
with  the  baby's  little  hand. 

She  knew — they  all  knew — everybody  knew 
but  Virginia's  husband.  What  did  she  know? 
Why,  she  knew  that  John  Bennett  was  in  love 
with  Virginia,  desperately  in  love  with  her. 
But  then,  that  wasn't  anything;  loads  of  men 
had  been  in  love  with  Virginia. 

Their  names  had  been  coupled  already,  over 
and  over  again  in  Syracuse  and  Newport ;  but 
Virginia's  name  stood  much,  and  no  one  ever 
really  supposed  that  Peter  Bathurst,  Senior, 
was  the  kind  of  man  to  endure  the  slightest 
pang  of  jealousy. 

To  Grace,  with  her  heart  at  peace,  with  her 
child  in  her  arms,  and  her  husband  not  far 
away,  the  idea  of  Virginia's  romance  was  not 
246 


THE    SUSPICION 

sympathetic;  she  didn't  think  for  a  moment 
that  Virginia  cared  a  bit,  but  she  thought  that 
she  was  ruining  the  life  of  a  young  man. 

"Poor  fellow,"  she  said  to  herself,  "poor 
John!" 

"I  wonder,"  she  reflected  as  the  baby's  hand 
beat  against  the  glass,  "I  wonder  that  she  lets 
him  come  here  like  this,  with  all  the  men  away. 
She  knows  that  people  talk  and  what  they  say. 
I  don't  know  what  the  Valley  will  say  now;  I 
really  don't  know." 

She  wondered  so  long  and  so  profoundly 
that  her  thoughts  began  to  grow  complicated, 
and  her  cheeks  grew  red  and  her  face  troubled. 

"Oh,  no,"  she  said  aloud,  "it  isn't  possible, 
it  couldn't  be  possible !" 


247 


CHAPTER  XX 

WITHOUT  MERCY 

JOHN,  coming  in  in  the  evening,  found  the 
house  deserted.  There  was  no  one  in  the 
library  before  the  fire  where  Virginia  had  been 
waiting  for  him;  she  had  left  before  his  trap 
drove  up  to  the  door.  There  was  no  one  to 
make  him  welcome,  and  from  the  servants 
who  took  his  luggage  and  showed  him  to  his 
room — his  own  old  room — he  learned  that  the 
family  were  away  for  the  most  part  and  no 
one  but  Mrs.  Peter,  Junior,  and  Mrs.  Bathurst, 
at  home. 

As  far  as  John  was  concerned  this  news  in 
itself  did  very  well  for  a  greeting,  and  he 
needed  all  the  time  there  was  before  dinner  in 
which  to  accustom  himself  to  the  knowledge 
that  he  was  to  be  practically  alone  with  his 
hostess  here.  His  fortnight  in  the  country  had 
248 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

made  him  restless  instead  of  quieting  him,  and 
his  heart  was  all  in  a  tumult — his  whole  nature 
like  the  summer  land  around  him,  ripe,  mature, 
ready  for  the  harvest. 

There  was  a  sweetness  and  a  charm,  some- 
thing more,  almost  a  delight  in  the  very  odor 
of  the  house  as  he  came  in  at  the  front  door. 
He  ran  up-stairs  before  the  man-servant  to 
his  room  and  saw  the  curtains  falling  white 
before  his  windows,  and  the  aspect  of  the 
place  had  the  familiarity  of  something  which 
he  had  known  and  loved,  and  where,  if  he  had 
been  unhappy,  he  had  as  well  experienced  his 
greatest  bliss. 

How  had  he  ever  lived  through  two  years 
without  seeing  her  again?  Why,  he  had  once 
held  her  in  his  arms  in  this  very  room,  and 
after  such  a  madness  she  let  him  now  come 
back  again — she  let  him  now  come  back  and 
find  her  here  with  no  one  else  to  claim  her. 
She  had  never  blamed  him,  never  referred  to 
that  past;  and  as  he  thought  this  he  rejoiced 
249 


FIRST    LOVE 

in  it — and  also  thought  in  wonder  and  amaze- 
ment and  with  a  great  tide  of  excitement  that 
almost  terrified  him  that  after  all  he  had  said 
in  his  daily  letters,  she  still  had  let  him  come 
to  her. 

He  dressed  leisurely  for  dinner,  and  he  was 
too  young  yet,  too  simple,  too  sincere  not  to 
take  a  great  pride  in  his  looks,  not  to  be  glad 
that  he  was  tall  and  strong  and  young.  He 
tied  his  cravat,  put  his  hair  in  order,  and  stood 
for  a  moment  before  he  went  down  with  his 
hand  on  the  door  that  two  years  before  he  had 
opened  for  her  with  such  mingled  emotions 
when  she  came  in  to  him  the  night  before  he 
left  Tallahoe.  But  as  he  went  down-stairs 
something  of  his  spirits  left  him,  for  he  realized 
that  now  when  he  looked  at  her  it  would  be 
with  the  knowledge  back  of  them  both  of 
everything  he  had  written  and  said.  He 
wondered  how  she  would  welcome  him,  what 
she  would  say?  And  if  he  should,  by  any 
chance,  find  her  alone — although  there  would 
250 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

be  nothing  easier  than  to  take  her  in  his  arms, 
would  he  dare  do  it? 

John  found  three  women  before  the  fire  in 
the  big  hall,  and  there  were  several  men  there, 
too,  whom  he  remembered  for  old  cronies. 
His  first  thought  was  something  of  relief,  and 
it  helped  him  to  gain  his  self-possession.  Mrs. 
Bathurst  gave  the  guest  her  hand  limply — she 
scarcely  touched  his — she  scarcely  spoke  to 
him,  she  didn't  look  at  him,  and  his  life  went 
out  of  him  at  her  soulless  welcome.  She  sent 
him  in  to  dinner  with  some  one  whom  in  his 
excitement  he  could  not  see — he  went  in  with 
a  girl  who  had  to  speak  to  him  twice  before 
John,  lifting  up  his  blue  eyes,  slowly  recog- 
nized her  to  be  an  old  friend. 

He  had  been  sent  in  to  dinner  with  a  mar- 
velously  good-looking  young  creature,  all  fire 
and  sparkle,  tall  and  bright-lipped.  She  turned, 
laughing  to  him. 

"How  perfectly  killing  of  you  not  to  know 
me!" 

251 


FIRST    LOVE 

"But  you  didn't  know  me,  did  you?"  he 
asked. 

"Naturally  not,"  she  said;  "Bennett  isn't 
an  uncommon  name ;  Mrs.  Bathurst  said  a  Mr. 
Bennett  was  here,  but  I  didn't  think  of  you, 
and  when  you  came  in  I  almost  roared,  do  you 
know." 

John's  hard  white  face  relaxed  a  little,  his 
brow  cleared  just  a  trifle.  "I  don't  really 
know  you  now,"  he  confessed,  "but  I  used  to 
know  you  very  well;  indeed,  I  called  you  by 
your  first  name." 

"Yes,  Johnny,"  she  nodded,  "perhaps  you 
did,  but  you  needn't  call  me  by  my  first  name 
now.  I  am  prouder  and  haughtier  than  I 
used  to  be.  Shall  I  tell  you  something?" 

"Yes,  do,"  he  urged. 

She  slightly  leaned  toward  him,  smiling  with 
amusement,  her  eyes  blue  as  Irish  lakes,  and 
she  whispered  with  a  pretty  combination  of 
grace  and  coquetry:  "Well,  your  hair  isn't 
really  red,  you  know !" 
252 


^ITHOUT    MERCY 

Bennett  smiled,  then  began  to  laugh.  "Why, 
that's  what  we  quarreled  over!  You  called 
me  red-head  and  I  was  perfectly  furious  with 
you." 

Gazing  at  the  hair  in  question,  his  com- 
panion said:  "I  should  say  it  was  more  pink 
than  red ;  but  it's  a  lovely  color,  and  you  have 
grown  crosser-looking  and  more  bad-humored 
than  ever." 

John  talked  to  her  through  dinner  and  he 
overdid  it.  She  acted  to  him  as  a  stimulant 
would  have  done  after  a  hard  race;  he  made 
himself  charming,  devoted;  there  was  a 
piquancy  in  the  situation ;  he  liked  to  have  her 
call  him  down  and  tease  him.  His  vivid 
recollections  of  her  had  an  agreeable  little  sting 
in  every  one  of  them,  for  he  had  loved  her 
madly  in  his  boyhood  and  she  had  turned  out 
to  be  a  ripping  girl. 

John  looked  during  dinner  not  once  toward 
his  hostess,  and  Mrs.  Peter  watched  his  polite- 
ness to  Milly  Haven  with  relief  and  content. 
253 


FIRST   LOVE 

Virginia  Bathurst  watched  him  too.    As  they 
came  out  together  she  said: 

"So  you  and  Mr.  Bennett  are  old  friends, 
Miss  Haven  ?" 

"Heavens,  yes,"  explained  the  girl.  "Why, 
he  was  in  love  with  me  when  I  was  in  short 
frocks,  and  we've  been  talking  about  it.  He 
was  awfully  amusing,  you  couldn't  think,  and 
he  ran  up  all  sorts  of  ridiculous  debts  buying 
me  flowers  and  getting  himself  a  dress-suit." 

She  linked  her  arm  in  Mrs.  Bathurst's  and 
looked  back  over  her  lovely  young  shoulder, 
white  as  a  snow  bank,  toward  the  room  where 
the  men  lingered  with  their  cigars. 

"Hasn't  he  turned  out  well,"  she  said 
warmly;  "isn't  he  nice  to  look  at?" 

And  after  her  hostess'  murmured  response 
she  defended  herself,  laughing:  "Oh,  I  don't 
doubt  he's  a  heart-breaker,  and  I'm  not  smitten 
with  him.  I  used  to  think  it  the  greatest  fun 
in  the  world  to  tease  him  to  death,  and  I  expect 
I  should  think  so  now." 
254 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

Milly  Haven  spoke  nonchalantly  with  the 
assurance  that  beauty  and  youth  give.  She 
turned  away  and  settled  her  mass  of  dark  hair 
before  an  old  mirror,  flanked  by  candle  lights. 
She  moved  well,  with  dignity  and  much  grace ; 
her  hair  had  no  lights  in  it,  nothing  but  the 
shades  of  night. 

"Grace,"  she  said,  "listen,  isn't  that  your 
baby?" 

"Yes,"  said  the  mother,  "he's  a  naughty 
thing  to-night,  he  absolutely  refuses  to  go  to 
sleep." 

"Oh,  let  me  run  up  to  him !"  Milly  exclaimed. 
"You  know  I  adore  him." 

As  she  went  up-stairs  without  waiting  for 
permission,  Grace  said  to  her  mother-in-law: 
"Isn't  she  stunning,  Virginia;  did  you  notice 
her  at  dinner  with  John?" 

"Charming,  charming  !** 

"Oh,  they're  too  beautiful  together,"  said 
the  young  married  woman  rapturously,  "made 
for  each  other.     I  knew  they'd  hit  it  off,  it's 
255 


FIRST   LOVE 

been  a  pet  dream  of  mine.    Oh,  dear,  I  hope  it 
won't  fall  through." 

Mrs.  Bathurst  went  to  the  fire  and  put  her 
foot  on  the  edge  of  the  firedog,  lifting  her 
dress  a  little  above  her  satin  shoe.  She  leaned 
on  the  mantelpiece  and  stared  down,  at  the 
flames.  She  had  chosen,  after  careful  thought, 
a  frock  brown  as  an  autumn  leaf  and  around 
her  waist  fell  a  long  scarf,  its  ends  hung  with 
little  gleaming  crystals.  They  dropped  into 
the  monotone  folds  of  the  chiffon  in  her  dress 
like  bits  of  ice  on  a  brown  forest  stream.  She 
had  dressed  with  care;  she  was  very  pale,  and 
her  pearls  added  to  her  pallor. 

Grace,  as  she  stood  by  her  side,  thought  she 
had  never  seen  Virginia  so  lovely  or  so  sad. 

"You've  no  bad  news,  have  you?" 

"Why  do  you  ask  it?  No." 

"You  seem  a  bit  tired." 

"I  rode  twenty  miles  and  the  horse  has  a 
hard  mouth." 

The  two  women  turned  at  a  sound  on  the 
256 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

stairway;  Milly  Haven  had  come  down  again 
with  Grace's  child  in  her  arms.  He  was  in 
his  night-dress  and  he  nestled  against  her. 

"Don't  bring  him  any  farther,  Milly,"  called 
his  mother,  "he'll  catch  cold.  What  a  perfect 
goose  you  are !  Take  him  back." 

As  the  men  came  out  of  the  dining-room 
Milly  Haven  remained  where  she  was,  laugh- 
ing and  holding  the  child  under  the  light  of  the 
first  turn  on  the  stairs. 

John  Bennett  looked  up  and  saw  her  and  the 
sudden  maturity  in  her  beauty,  a  pretty  mater- 
nity in  the  picture.  Reluctantly,  as  though  it 
were  against  his  will,  he  walked  slowly  over 
to  where  she  stood.  He  put  his  hand  out  to 
the  little  boy. 

"Hello,  Jackit,"  he  said,  "what's  the  row 
with  you?  He's  a  jolly  little  kid,  isn't  he?" 

"He's  a  darling  little  dear,"  said  the  girl 
warmly,  kissing  him. 

"Milly,"  cried  the  mother,  "please,  please 
take  him  back  to  the  nurse." 

257 


FIRST    LOVE 

And  the  girl  obeyed,  making  the  baby  wave 
an  affable  good  night  to  the  company;  then 
she  went  laughing  up-stairs  with  her  pretty 
burden. 

John  Bennett  watched  her,  waiting  until  she 
had  turned  out  of  sight;  then  he  slowly  trav- 
ersed the  room  to  the  fireplace. 

Sitting  there  with  all  of  them,  with  Mrs. 
Peter  and  his  hostess,  and  Donald  Dash- 
wood  and  the  others — not  with  Milly  Haven, 
for  she  didn't  come  back  and  he  didn't  miss 
her  or  know  of  her  absence — he  passed  the 
most  wretched  evening  of  his  life.  Although 
he  sat  where  he  could  see  his  hostess  and 
addressed  some  confused  words  to  her  that 
were  briefly  answered,  it  was  their  only  com- 
munion. He  watched  her  pale,  pure  cheek, 
and  he  felt  that  she  was  cold  and  dead  to  him 
— voiceless,  soundless  as  a  bell  which  has  been 
broken  in  the  mold.  The  poor  fellow  tried 
vainly  to  think  what  it  might  mean,  and  finally 
made  up  his  mind  that  she  was  angry  at  hii 
258 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

letters  and  that  she  had  let  him  come  to  tell 
him  so,  to  put  him  definitely  in  his  place,  and 
for  just  this  reason  she  had  let  him  come  here 
when  she  would  be  alone  and  could  tell  him 
his  fate.  His  misery  was  so  keen,  his  sense 
of  desolation  so  complete,  that  his  face  aged 
in  that  half  hour  as  he  sat  there  and  let  his 
heart  cry  out  to  the  woman  in  her  saffron  dress 
with  the  crystal  beads  that  hung  like  trickling 
silver  down  the  brown  folds  of  her  gown.  His 
whole  state  of  mind  had  altered;  try  as  he 
would  he  couldn't  bring  up  one  sweet,  con- 
soling memory.  His  companion  of  the  sum- 
mer evenings  on  the  yacht,  the  love  of  his 
dreams,  seemed  defaced  from  the  universe  and 
this  belle  dame  sans  merci  to  have  taken  her 
place. 

"Gosh,"  he  breathed  to  himself,  "I  wonder 
if  she  thinks  it's  fair  to  make  a  chap  go  through 
such  hell?" 

But  she  never  stirred  from  her  quiet  indo- 
lent indifference  throughout  the  evening,  and 
259 


FIRST    LOVE 

even  the  others  found  her  unresponsive  and 
left  early.  Grace  lingered  as  though  she  did 
not  want  to  leave  them  alone  together,  but 
finally  she,  too,  went  up-stairs;  and  then  John 
drew  his  breath  in  so  that  it  came  cold  around 
his  heart  and  seemed  to  hold  it  like  a  vise. 
Like  a  man  thrown  into  a  whirlpool  and  bid- 
den to  swim  for  his  life,  he  heard  the  rushing 
waters  thunder  in  his  ears  and  his  very  lips 
tasted  of  salt,  as  if  the  spray  had  touched 
them. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  was  immovable  before  him; 
the  firelight  around  her,  the  crystals  gleaming 
on  her  dress — she  swung  one  small  foot  in  its 
satin  shoe  to  and  fro;  it  marked  his  hour  for 
him  like  a  living  pendulum.  John  waited  until 
every  sound  had  died  away,  then  he  came 
over  and  sat  down  by  her  in  the  chair  close 
at  her  side.  No  fewer  than  a  hundred  first 
words  had  been  forming  in  his  mind,  but  he 
threw  them  all  away — he  simply  sat  and  looked 
at  her  so  long  and  without  one  word  that 
260 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

she  finally  turned  her  head  and  the  great  pallor 
of  her  face  was  swept  to  scarlet. 

"Well,"  she  said  evenly,  "does  it  seem  like 
old  times  here?"  She  tried  to  smile  at  him, 
bit  her  lip,  and  stopped. 

"I  meant,"  said  Bennett,  striving  with  his 
thick  voice  to  articulate  clearly,  "I  meant 
every  word  that  I  wrote  you  in  those  letters, 
every  single  word." 

And  Mrs.  Bathurst  said:  "I've  kept  those 
letters,  every  one." 

"Oh—" 

"I'll  give  them  back  to  you;  you  may  use 
them  all  again ;  they're  far  too  good  to  waste, 
John." 

She  struggled  again  with  herself  and,  win- 
ning again,  said,  with  his  hardening  face  to 
help: 

"I  mean  to  say,  when  you  make  love  to 

her — a  nice   girl,   some  girl   whom  you  can 

marry,  you  can  copy  those  out  to  her — you 

might  even  send  them  as  they  are,  some  of 

261 


FIRST    LOVE 

them  have  no  beginning  or  end."  She  laughed 
gently  and  put  out  one  of  her  lovely  hands. 
"My  dear  boy,  don't  look  so  savage,  please." 

The  waters  that  had  surged  around  him 
began  to  die  down;  the  spray  on  his  lips  was 
turning  to  a  burning  fire. 

"Is  this  the  way  women  do,"  he  said,  "is 
this  the  way  ?  Is  it  the  way  you  do  to  Pyrnne 
and  others?  No,  no,"  he  interrupted  himself, 
"no,  you  don't  mean  it,  you're  only  angry  at 
me  for  something  I  can't  guess.  I  know  I  was 
mad  to  go  on  as  I  did,  but  I  couldn't  help  it ; 
you  forbade  me  to  speak  and  I  had  to  write. 
I  was  afraid  that  you'd  send  them  all  back  to 
me,  but  you  didn't."  And  here,  with  the  ten- 
sion snapped  for  a  moment,  he  broke  forth: 
"It's  no  crime  to  love  you,  is  it  ?" 

And  those  words  freed  him,  as  though  the 
four  letters  that  made  the  word  love  were  the 
wand  to  knock  off  his  chains.  He  had  both 
her  hands ;  struggle  as  she  would,  she  couldn't 
get  away.  But  she  kept  up,  she  kept  up. 
262 


WITHOUT   MERCY 

He  repeated:  "It's  no  crime  just  to  love 
you,  is  it?  Oh,  do  you  hear  me?"  And  he 
said  it,  not  knowing  any  words  more  eloquent, 
twenty  times. 

If  he  only  might  have  possessed  then  the 
penetration  to  see  behind  that  quiet  face,  to 
have  known  for  one  second  of  a  lifetime  what 
a  perfect  mate  she  was  for  him,  then — 

"Will  you  let  my  hands  go,  John,  will  you 
let  them  go  ?  There.  Will  you  get  up,  John  ?" 

They  both  rose. 

"Good  night,  good  night;  you  promised  not 
to  do  this,  you  know — you've  gone  back  on 
your  word,  you  are  very,  very  foolish  and  very 
young.  You  will  never  listen  to  me." 

Bennett  said  something  under  his  breath 
and  came  close  to  her,  fixing  his  darkened  eyes 
on  her  face. 

"I  will  listen,"  he  murmured;  "I  want  to 
listen,  and  I  want  to  hear  you  say  just  one 
thing." 

"I  will  never  say  it,"  she  said,  "never." 
263 


FIRST   LOVE 

She  had  once  before  used  the  words  she  now 
employed :  "Foolish  boy,  foolish  boy.  My  poor 
John!" 

"For  God's  sake,"  he  cried,  "don't  use 
those  words;  it  isn't  possible  that  you  don't 
care  for  me,  it  isn't  possible !" 

Then,  as  he  saw  she  was  going  to  make  him 
an  answer,  he  put  out  his  hand:  "Don't  tell 
me,  don't."  He  turned  his  young  face  away, 
and  if  he  had  not  done  so  then  he  would  have 
seen  her  as  she  was,  for  her  mask  fell  at  the 
sight  of  his  emotion. 

"You'll  get  over  this,"  she  said  gently ;  "you 
will  forget  it  all." 

"Hush,"  he  said  fiercely,  "I  want  to  die 
with  it." 

And  she  laughed  softly,  but  not  without 
tenderness. 

"Nonsense,"  she  answered  him,  "don't  think 
of  death — your  life  is  all  before  you.  Remem- 
ber that  picture  that  we've  both  just  seen  on  the 
stairs." 

264 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

But  before  she  could  finish  he  had  caught 
her  hand  again  brutally. 

"I  don't  know  why  you  treat  me  so,"  he 
said;  "why  you  make  fun  of  me  and  laugh 
at  me.  I'm  a  man  and  my  life  is  all  yours,  all 
yours.  Oh,"  he  breathed,  drinking  in  her  face 
with  his  ardent  eyes,  "how  I  love  you !  Don't 
you  want  it,  don't  you  want  me  ?" 

She  said  to  herself  under  her  breath:  "I 
can't  last  for  ever;  just  a  minute  more,  just  a 
little  more — "  And  at  bay  before  him  she 
made  one  final  try.  "What  are  you  asking 
me  for?"  She  put  it  to  him,  controlling  her 
voice  and  her  eyes. 

And  he  stammered,  made  a  desperate  ges- 
ture and  whispered  close  to  her :  "I  love  you, 
you  know  that,  I  love  you.  When  I  was  a  boy 
you  came  then — you  were  kind — and  ever 
since  then  I've  looked  to  you,  to  you — for  all." 

Trying  again,  trying  again  and  winning, 
smiling  on  him  defiantly  with  the  old  dear 
smile,  having  herself  well  in  hand  and  daring 
265 


FIRST   LOVE 

to  do  so,  she  put  her  hands  against  his  broad 
chest,  both  her  hands,  and  met  his  eyes  with 
her  own. 

"John,"  she  said,  "John,  I  remember  that 
time,  too.  Trust  me,  go  on  trusting  me;  it's 
all  right,  go  on  looking  to  me." 

And  he  stammered:  "You  mean — you 
mean — " 

"I  mean,"  she  said,  "that  you  must  go  up- 
stairs to  your  room,  please.  I  ask  you  to  go." 

But  brought  out  of  the  dazzling  passion,  in 
which  he  had  nearly  lost  his  reason,  by  her 
serenity  and  her  quiet,  he  said  more  calmly: 

"Not  until  you  promise  me,  not  until  you 
promise  me." 

Seeing  that  he  was  not  to  be  withstood, 
knowing  that  her  own  powers  of  resistance 
were  at  their  end,  she  said  desperately :  "Prom- 
ise you  what — what  do  you  want?" 

And  once  again  he  whispered,  "All." 

And  it  was  perfectly  useless  for  her  to  hold 
out  her  hand  to  keep  him  back,  quite  useless; 
266 


WITHOUT   MERCY 

he  had  taken  her  again  in  his  arms,  and  he 
never  forgot  throughout  his  life  the  wonder  of 
it,  the  marvel  of  it.  For  this  time  was  unlike 
the  other  time ;  this  time  she  knew,  and  she  was 
looking  at  him  with  a  light  in  her  eyes,  even  as 
he  kissed  her  lids  down. 

"I  want  you,"  he  stammered,  "I  want  you, 
Virginia."  He  dared  to  call  her  name,  to 
breathe  it,  as  he  had  called  it  in  his  dreams. 
"You  must  marry  me,  you  must  divorce  that 
drunken  beast." 

From  his  broad  shoulders,  all  the  length  of 
his  splendid  body,  she  felt  him  as  he  held  her, 
and  she  knew  that  he  would  never  be  any  other 
woman's  as  he  was  hers,  and  that  no  other 
woman  would  ever  touch  the  clear  marvel  of 
the  first  wine  of  John's  first  love. 

When  she  found  her  breath,  she  said : 
"There's  some  one  on  the  stairs,  I  hear  them ; 
will  you  set  me  free?" 

And  once  again,  without  any  fear  of  detec- 
tion, he  said :   "Not  until  you  promise  me." 
267 


FIRST    LOVE 

"You  mean,"  she  whispered,  "that  you  look 
to  me — " 

And  he  cried  :  "Yes,  for  all." 

And  she  assented :  "I  promise  you.  I  promise 
you — let  me  go." 

And  John,  still  holding  her,  demanded  again : 
"All?" 

She  repeated  the  word  to  him :  "All." 

"Mrs.  Bathurst,  Mrs.  Bathurst— "  Milly 
Haven's  voice,  cautious,  cleverly  distanced,  as 
though  she  were  too  wise  a  woman  to  come 
suddenly  on  a  tete-a-tete — and  Milly  appeared 
on  the  landing,  slowly  coming  down  the  broad 
stairs. 

"Mrs.  Bathurst,  are  you  there?  Won't  you 
come  up?  Grace's  little  boy  isn't  well." 

Pausing  on  the  last  step,  Milly  looked  into 
the  shadow  of  the  room,  where  the  lamplight 
and  the  firelight  were  insufficient  illumination. 
Virginia  went  quickly  over  to  her. 

"Come  up,  will  you?  Jackit's  very  feverish. 
And,  Johnny,"  she  called  easily  and  a  little 
268 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

imperiously  over  to  the  young  man  who  had 
not  moved  from  his  place  before  the  fire, 
"Johnny  Bennett,  won't  you  telephone  to  the 
doctor  ?  Doctor  Shepherd,  at  the  Big  Tree  Inn. 
That's  right,  isn't  it,  Mrs.  Bathurst  ?" 

Later,  much  later,  well  on  toward  four 
o'clock,  Milly  Haven  was  awakened  out  of  a 
doze  by  her  beautiful  hostess  coming  into  the 
room, 

"Oh,  is  the  baby  worse?"  cried  Milly,  start- 
ing up  in  bed. 

Virginia  held  her  dressing-gown  close 
around  her  and  sat  down  on  the  side  of  Milly's 
bed. 

Miss  Haven  had  never  seen  Mrs.  Bathurst 
before  that  afternoon,  and  she  never  forgot 
how  that  lady  impressed  her  on  this  sudden 
and  unexpected  visit  toward  the  dawn.  Flushed 
by  her  anxiety  for  Grace's  baby,  no  doubt, 
tired  from  her  long  watching,  her  slender 
beautiful  hands  holding  her  gown  across  her 
269 


FIRST   LOVE 

breast,  the  lovely  disorder  of  her  dark  hair, 
she  was  an  unusual  picture. 

"No,  no,  the  baby's  all  right.  He's  asleep; 
it  was  nothing  but  a  little  indigestion.  Grace 
is  asleep,  too." 

As  it  appeared  then,  Mrs.  Bathurst  was  the 
only  one  in  the  house  who  was  not  asleep. 

"But  I've  been  horribly  restless,  and  as  I 
looked  out  of  my  window  I  thought  I  saw  a 
man  moving  across  the  lawn.  Of  course,  it 
was  ridiculous;  there's  no  one  in  the  house, 
but  my  room  was  intolerable  to  me." 

Milly  afterward  thought  that  she  had  not 
once  considered  her  as  a  person,  though  she 
bent  and  lightly  touched  the  young  girl's  head. 

"I  think  I'm  rather  nervous  to-night,"  she 
said.  "I  know  I've  disturbed  you  very  much, 
I  hope  you  will  forgive  me." 

"Oh,"  Milly  exclaimed  warmly,  "I'm  aw- 
fully glad  that  you  felt  that  you  could  come  or 
that  I  could  be  of  any  use." 

She  tried  to  lift  her  heavy  eyelids  and  to 
270 


WITHOUT    MERCY 

seem  intelligent;  she  had  been  profoundly 
asleep  when  Virginia  awakened  her. 

Mrs.  Bathurst  said  more  naturally,  with  her 
lovely  smile:  "Don't  try  to  stay  awake,  go 
to  sleep  again.  If  you'll  let  me,  I'll  throw 
myself  down  on  your  lounge  and  rest  there." 

"Oh,  no,"  said  the  girl,  "you'll  be  cold." 
She  made  a  place  by  her  side.  "Lie  here." 
She  drew  the  coverlid  over  the  beautiful  figure 
of  her  hostess,  and  by  Milly  Haven's  side  the 
lady  lay  so  quietly  that  she  seemed  to  rest. 

Milly  Haven,  on  the  contrary,  remained  for 
some  time  awake,  wondering  many  things  in 
her  clever  mind,  thinking  out  in  a  direct  fashion 
a  point  of  view,  and  her  young  cheeks  grew 
warm  and  her  eyes  kindled  in  the  dark,  and 
some  of  her  meditations  were  as  profound  as 
her  neighbor's. 

The  blue  eyes,  whose  darlc  color  had  in- 
spired little  John  Bennett  to  send  gentians  at 
Easter,  grew  soft,  and  their  sparkle,  too  keen 
and  bright  for  tenderness,  as  a  rule,  dimmed, 
271 


FIRST    LOVE 

and  Milly  Haven's  Irish  eyes  were  soft  under 
her  long  lashes. 

Mrs.  Bathurst's  breath  came  evenly  at  last, 
and  Milly  had  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that 
her  human  propinquity  had  proved  a  reposing 
element  for  the  lady  in  some  trouble  or  other ; 
and  then  Mflly  herself  fell  asleep,  and  when  she 
finally  awakened  from  a  dream  in  which  she 
was  trying  to  pull  John  Bennett  out  of  a  fish- 
pond where  he  was  gathering  water-lilies, 
Milly  found  that  her  companion  was  gone,  and 
nothing  but  a  long  imprint  on  the  bed  and  a 
crushed  pillow  told  her  that  Mrs.  Bathurst's 
visit  had  been  a  reality. 


272 


CHAPTER  XXI 

A  NURSERY  RHYME 

JOHN  BENNETT,  at  noon  the  next  day, 
was  aware  of  an  infernal  pounding  on  his 
door.  He  had  been  dreaming  as  well  as  Milly 
Haven,  but  his  dreams  were  not  about  fish- 
ponds or  lilies,  and  there  wasn't  any  Irish-eyed 
girl  in  them.  And  when  the  knock  came  and 
the  voice  there  was  something  in  it  that  re- 
called pleasure,  and  for  this  reason  he  opened 
his  eyes,  heavy  with  the  late  sleep  of  the  morn- 
ing. 

"John,  John,"  he  recognized  the  voice  as 
Grace's,  "do  get  up,  it's  nearly  noon  and  we 
want  to  know  when  to  order  the  horses." 

Bennett  jumped  out  of  bed  and  cautiously 
opened  his  door  a  bit.   "Hello,  what's  the  row, 
what  does  anybody  want  to  do?" 
273 


FIRST   LOVE 

"Why,  don't  you  want  to  ride  before  lunch- 
con?" 

"Love  it.  What  are  the  rest  going  to  do  ?" 
"I'll  telephone  the  stables ;  and  hurry,  John." 
In  an  hour  John  came  down  into  the  glori- 
ous morning  with,  as  he  supposed,  a  new  world 
for  his  own,  inhabited  by  one  woman  and  him- 
self, and  that  woman  was  to  be  his.  He  loved 
her :  every  other  consideration  was  a  phantom. 
The  horses  were  waiting  at  the  steps,  the 
bay  mare  which  he  liked  to  ride  and  the  new 
Ladybird,  with  a  side-saddle  for — as  John 
thought  with  a  bounding  heart — for  his  mis- 
tress. His  mistress — his  hot  blood  showed 
how  Kis  shame,  young  as  he  was,  glowed  at 
the  word;  this  was  what  she  would  be,  if  she 
couldn't  get  a  divorce  from  her  husband.  But 
of  course  she  could,  and  she  would;  that 
wasn't  in  the  question.  Even  this  hour  would 
not  go  by  before  he  would  see  her  again,  and 
he  looked  toward  the  staircase  for  her  to  come 
down. 

274 


A    NURSERY   RHYME 

Up-stairs  in  the  hall,  little  Jack's  nurse  was 
standing — little  Jack  was  well,  then,  this  morn- 
ing— and  he  was  being  bidden  to 

"Ride  a  cock  horse  to  Banbury  Cross," 

and  the  quaint  words  caught  John's  ear  in  the 
silence  of  the  house. 

John  the  night  before  had  been  completely 
mad.  He  had  gone  to  Mrs.  Bathurst's  boudoir 
and  waited  for  her  there  until  she  should  come 
out  of  Grace's  room  later.  But  she  had  not 
come,  and  when  at  length  he  had  stolen  to  his 
own  apartment,  the  dawn  had  risen  in  the  east. 

"To  see  a  fine  lady  get  on  a  white  horse." 

He  heard  a  step  in  the  corridor  and  his  heart 
stopped  its  beat;  he  would  help  her  on  to  her 
horse  and  they  would  ride  away  together,  and 
would  there  be  any  place  far  enough  away,  any 
wood  deep  enough,  any  wonderful,  golden  yel- 
275 


FIRST    LOVE 

low,  mellow  autumn  wood  sweet  enough  for 
him  to  ride  into  with  her? 

The  lady  in  her  riding-habit  had  fairly  come 
up  to  his  side  before  he  saw  that  it  was  not 
Mrs.  Bathurst 

"Are  you  ready?"  Milly  Haven  asked. 
"Come,  then — it's  nearly  one  o'clock,  and  we 
can  ride  only  an  hour.  Isn't  it  a  glorious  day  ?" 

Milly  wasn't  a  giggling  girl,  she  didn't  even 
smile  very  much ;  she  was  mature  for  her  years. 
She  had  a  fine,  well-moulded  figure;  she  rode 
straight,  her  brown  habit  suited  her  tint  and 
her  color  perfectly.  She  tranquilly  drew  on  her 
gloves. 

"Grace  says  I  may  ride  the  horse  you  sent 
on  from  the  West  for  Mr.  Bathurst.  Isn't  she 
a  pretty  creature  ?  Are  you  ready  ?" 

John  Bennett  followed  her  in  silence,  he  had 
not  even  bidden  her  good  morning;  as  she 
passed  out  he  gave  a  despairing  glance  up  the 
stairway,  where,  his  blond  head  shining  in  the 
sun,  little  Johnny  was  in  his  nurse's  arms. 
276 


A    NURSERY    RHYME 
The  nurse  sang  her  chant : 

"Humpty-Dumpty  had  a  great  fall,  had  a 
great  fall." 

John  lagged  behind  his  companion,  and  the 
groom  helped  Miss  Haven  to  mount  Ladybird. 

Miss  Haven  took  her  time,  settled  herself 
comfortably  in  the  saddle,  gay,  debonair  and 
happy. 

As  Bennett  flung  his  leg  over  his  horse  he 
said:  "Anybody  else  riding?" 

"No  one  else,"  responded  his  companion; 
"poor  Grace  is  done  up  after  last  night,  and 
I  guess  Mrs.  Bathurst  must  be  at  Albany  by 
this." 

"Albany?"  he  repeated. 

"Why,  yes,  that's  the  route  for  Saratoga, 
isn't  it?" 

And  at  his  blank  staring  she  exclaimed : 

"Why  evidently  you  don't  know ;  didn't  any- 
body tell  you  ?  Mrs.  Bathurst  left  at  eight  this 
277 


FIRST   LOVE 

morning  for  Saratoga.  Mr.  Bathurst  tele- 
phoned her  to  go  on  for  the  steeplechase,  and 
of  course  when  a  woman's  married — I  suppose 
she  has  to  obey." 


278 


CHAPTER  XXII 

A  SCENE 

AS  soon  as  Bennett  could  make  a  decent 
excuse  and  get  away,  he  went  to  Sara- 
toga, and  the  first  person  he  saw  after  leaving 
his  train  was  Peter  Bathurst,  Senior,  in  the 
bar  of  the  United  States  Hotel.  The  gentle- 
man was  being  piloted  away  by  a  book-maker 
evading  the  new  law  by  the  help  of  his  worthy 
friends.  Bathurst  was  not  so  intoxicated  as 
not  to  recognize  his  sons'  college  friend,  and 
held  out  his  hand  affably. 

"Benny,  Benny,"  gasped  the  congressman, 
"my  dear  old  frien',  John  Benny.  Got  any 
money?  Here's  Van  Cortlandt,  he'll  take  care 
of  it  for  you,  old  fell.  Come  in  see  us,  come 
see  m'  wife." 

Bennett  got  away  from  him  not  without 
279 


FIRST   LOVE 

cursing  his  existence.  "Bound  to  this  beast," 
he  thought,  "tied  to  this  sot!"  He  couldn't 
bear  the  sight  of  Bathurst. 

The  next  person  to  cross  his  path  was  Nich- 
olas Pyrnne.  The  honorable  gentleman  wore  a 
smart  costume  in  the  height  of  summer  fashion, 
and  sported  a  flower  in  his  buttonhole;  he 
looked  extremely  fit  and  debonair,  and  came 
brightly  along  the  piazza  of  the  United  States 
Hotel,  the  very  picture  of  good  spirits  and 
good  cheer. 

"Hello,  Bennett!"  he  exclaimed  heartily. 
"Where  did  you  drop  from?  I  haven't  seen 
you  for  an  age.  You've  left  the  West,  then? 
The  Bathursts  are  all  here,  do  you  know?" 

"Yes,"  returned  the  other,  "I've  just  seen 
the  governor  now.  I'm  looking  for  Jack  and 
Peter." 

"Why,  the  whole  lot  of  them  are  out  at  the 

De  Puysters'  for  lunch.    You'll  come  along, 

too,  won't  you?    I'll  be  responsible  for  your 

welcome.   The  De  Puysters  keep  open  house." 

280 


A    SCENE 

"No,  no,"  Bennett  refused;  "I'll  run  in  to 
see  them  when  they  come  back  later." 

"Married  yet?"  Nicholas  asked  as  they 
walked  along  together.  "That  pretty  little  Miss 
Forsythe.  .  .  .  You  know,  of  course,  and 
Jack— " 

"Yes,"  Bennett  nodded. 

When  Pyrnne  finally  left  him  at  the  motor- 
car into  which  he  got  to  drive  out  to  the  De 
Puysters'  place,  John  felt  completely  left  out 
and  put  aside.  A  terrible  misgiving  suddenly 
came  over  him  at  the  sight  of  Pyrnne,  at  the 
sight  of  Mr.  Bathurst,  and  the  atmosphere  of 
Saratoga,  its  garish,  blatant  ugliness,  the 
smell,  the  temper  of  the  place,  all  assumed  a 
sudden  gross  reality  to  him,  and  he  felt  at  last 
as  though  he  were  beginning  to  waken  out  of 
a  long,  long  dream. 

He  wrote  to  Mrs.  Bathurst  a  passionate  ap- 
peal, and,  with  quantities  of  flowers,  he  sent 
the  letter  to  the  hotel  where  the  Bathursts  were 
stopping. 

281 


FIRST    LOVE 

When  she  received  the  sudden  gift,  Virginia 
held  the  letter  to  her  lips — she  wore  it  for  days 
in  her  bosom — she  didn't  read  one  line  of  it 
then,  but  John  couldn't  know  that  .  .  .  she 
put  his  flowers  away  and  kept  them  until  they 
were  ghosts  and  dried,  until  they  fell  apart  like 
dust,  but  he  never  knew  these  things. 

At  tea-time,  having  received  no  answer  to 
his  letter,  John  went  in  to  see  her  sitting  with 
visitors.  His  first  glance  showed  him  that  she 
had  changed  wonderfully  and  her  face  was  al- 
tered so  that  it  made  him  sick  to  see  the  trans- 
formation. Virginia  Bathurst's  youth  was 
gone,  her  contours  had  sharpened,  and  to  any 
one  but  a  man  mad  in  idolatrous  love,  she 
would  have  seemed  less  beautiful  and  much 
aged. 

Nicholas  Pyrnne,  as  well  as  several  other 
men,  were  there  with  her,  and  John  discovered 
that  Peter,  Junior,  had  gone  back  to  Tallahoe 
to  his  wife  and  child,  and  that  Jack  had 
gone  back  to  Tallahoe  to  his  fiancee,  and  no 
282 


A    SCENE 

one  vouchsafed  any  information  about  Mr. 
Bathurst,  Senior. 

The  lady  welcomed  him  as  though  he  were 
her  boys'  friend;  she  said  how  sorry  she  was 
that  they  had  both  gone,  and  what  a  pity  it 
was  that  John  hadn't  known  it.  She  talked  to 
Pyrnne  as  she  used  to  do  in  the  Valley,  before 
John  Bennett  had  told  her  how  he  loved  her — 
before  he  held  her  in  his  arms  and  kissed  her 
.  .  .  kissed  her.  He  said  these  things  over 
to  himself  defiantly  as  he  sat  there  staring  at 
her,  and  he  bore  her  cruelty  with  bitter  indig- 
nation. "She's  a  cruel,  cruel  coquette,"  he 
raged  within  himself;  "she's  a  wicked,  wicked 
woman."  And  then  he  contradicted  and  af- 
firmed that  she  was  broken-hearted  and  suf- 
fering, that  she  was  so  good,  so  heavenly  good 
that  she  was  reproaching  herself,  and  his  wild 
chivalry  provided  him  with  the  needed  cour- 
age to  speak  to  her.  .  .  .  She  hardly  an- 
swered him. 

Then  he  thought  miserably:  "She's  angry 
283 


FIRST    LOVE 

with  me,  I've  offended  her."  And  on  this  he 
built  his  hopes,  settling  back  in  his  chair  and 
doggedly  determining  to  outstay  every  man  of 
them. 

She  tolerated  his  presence,  scarcely  speak- 
ing to  him,  ignoring  him  as  though  he  had  been 
a  mere  boy,  awkwardly  lingering  on,  unbidden, 
endured. 

At  length,  the  others  took  leave,  but  John 
didn't  budge — Pyrnne  rose  the  last  and  looked 
over  at  him. 

"Which  way  are  you  going,  Bennett?" 

The  young  man's  voice  was  hoarse  as  he  an- 
swered : 

"Why,  I'm  not  going  anywhere  right  now, 
Pyrnne;  I'm  going  to  stop  here  another  few 
moments." 

But  Mrs.  Bathurst  interrupted  him:  "I'm 
going  out  to  dine  with  Mr.  Pyrnne  myself; 
we  might  all  go  down  together.  Won't  you 
wait,  Nicholas,  until  I  fetch  my  hat  and  gloves, 
and  we'll  run  along?"  And  when  she  returned 
284 


A    SCENE 

to  the  drawing-room  after  quite  a  long  time, 
Pyrnne  had  mercifully  left  the  room  and  the 
lover  was  in  it  alone.  .  .  .  He  stood  there 
white  as  death;  his  patent  misery  and  his  de- 
spair and  anger  challenged  her. 

"What  have  I  done,  what  have  I  done,  that 
you  should  treat  me  so  ?"  he  broke  forth.  "Do 
you  want  me  to  kill  myself !" 

At  these  words  she  seemed  startled  at  first, 
but  said  quite  calmly  and  with  much  sternness : 
"It's  impossible  even  to  see  you,  you  make  it 
impossible.  I  want  you  to  go  to-night  from 
Saratoga,  not  to  try  to  see  me  any  more.  You 
don't  want  to  force  me  to — "  and  she  stopped 
here,  although  her  voice  was  perfectly  in  con- 
trol. 

"Why,  you  forget,"  he  cried  wildly,  "you 
forget!"  His  cheeks  crimsoned,  the  tears 
sprang  to  his  eyes. 

"I  shall  never  forget  that  I  have  liked  you 
very  much,  and  I  hope  you  won't  make  me  do 
so.  Please,  please — " 

285 


FIRST    LOVE 

She  drew  her  hands  away  from  him  and  he 
stammered:  "You  promised,  you  promised," 
and  caught  her  hands  again  in  spite  of  her  de- 
fense and  crushed  them. 

"You  don't  love  me,  then?"  he  asked  des- 
perately. "You  don't  love  me  ?" 

His  passion,  his  youth,  his  pleading  blinded 
him — he  saw  neither  pity  nor  kindness  in  her 
face. 

"Tell  me,  answer  me,  don't  you — don't  you 
caref" 

"Why,  of  course  not,"  she  said  with  effort, 
"how  absurd!  Come,  John,  do  have  common 
sense." 

Cruelty  was  the  best  remedy  she  knew.  She 
stood  like  a  surgeon  with  the  knife. 

Then  Bennett  gave  a  wild  cry,  and  flung  her 
hands  away  as  though  they  had  been  objects 
of  a  despised  spoil  and  he  didn't  want  them 
any  more.  Then  he  laughed  like  a  crazy  man 
and  caught  her  to  him  violently,  pressed  her 
to  him  until  she  felt  the  very  iron  of  his  bones 
286 


A   SCENE 

and  muscles  against  her  and  felt  knit  to  him, 
and  he  kissed  her  until  she  cried  out  for  mercy 
against  his  burning  lips. 

"There,"  he  panted,  "there.  No  matter 
what  you  say,  you  are  mine.  No  man  has  ever 
kissed  you  more!" 

He  flung  her  violently  from  him,  and  before 
she  could  speak  to  him,  had  she  possessed  the 
power  to  speak,  Bennett  rushed  from  the  room, 
and  in  the  hall  collided  with  Nicholas  Pyrnne, 
who  was  on  his  happy  way  to  his  appointment 
with  Mrs.  Bathurst.  Bennett  dashed  past  the 
Albanian  without  a  greeting,  and  Pyrnne,  as 
he  came  into  the  sitting-room,  said : 

"Why,  Virginia,  what  have  you  done  to  poor 
young  Bennett !  He  nearly  toppled  me  over  as 
I  passed  him  just  now  in  the  corridor." 

The  woman  he  came  to  see  was' standing  by 
the  center-table  in  the  room,  leaning  on  it, 
some  agitation  visible  on  her  beautiful  face; 
but  she  had  heard  Pyrnne's  step — she  had 
pulled  herself  together,  after  the  manner  of 
287 


FIRST    LOVE 

women  of  the  world.  Nicholas  was  himself  too 
happy  to  be  suspicious.  He  felt  himself  nearer 
to  Virginia  Bathurst  than  he  had  ever  been  in 
his  life,  for  not  three  days  before  she  had 
telegraphed  him  to  meet  her  at  Albany,  and 
they  had  come  up  here  on  the  train  together 
to  join  Peter  Bathurst,  Senior.  After  two  years 
she  had  sent  for  Nicholas  to  come  to  her,  and 
he  had  quietly  obeyed  without  one  word  or  re- 
mark or  reminder,  without  one  demand.  He 
was  profoundly  happy. 

After  a  few  words  of  greeting,  she  said :  "I 
can't  go  out  to  dinner  to-night,  Nicholas." 

"Really!  Are  you  ill?" 

"I'm  enervee.  I've  just  had  a  terrible  scene 
with  John  Bennett.  He's  in  trouble  and  he 
came  to  confide  in  me." 

"Oh,"  accepted  her  companion,  his  nice  eyes 
not  changing  their  expression,  "poor  chap,  I'm 
awfully  sorry,  but  don't  let  it  knock  you  all  out 
like  this." 

"But  it  has,"  said  the  woman  with  an  effort, 
288 


A    SCENE 

"and  I  shan't  go  out.  It's  given  me  a  nasty 
headache." 

And  Pyrnne  expostulated :  "Don't  spoil  our 
fun  because  the  third  person  is  out  of  sorts, 
Virginia.  It  shall  be,  however,  just  as  you  say, 
my  dear ;  but  I  think  a  little  air  and  music  and 
a  cocktail  will  set  you  up.  I  don't  want  you  to 
stop  here  and  brood  about  this  boy.  It's  far 
better  to  come  with  me  as  we  planned." 

"Do  you  think  so?" 

"Of  course  I  do,"  he  answered  decidedly. 
She  hesitated;  she  didn't  want  to  spoil  his 
pleasure,  she  didn't  want  to  make  another  inch 
of  misery  or  even  cast  another  cloud.  She  again 
took  up  her  gloves,  which  she  had  drawn  off. 

"Very  well  then — come — let  us  go.    ...  " 

"Splendid!"  he  cried,  beaming  with  the 
pleasure  her  concession  gave  him.  "You're  the 
right  sort."  He  lifted  her  hand  to  his  lips  and 
kissed  it.  He  didn't  ask  her  anything  about 
Bennett's  trouble,  he  didn't  think  he  needed  to 
ask.  He  had  no  jealousy  as  he  thought  of  him, 
289 


FIRST   LOVE 

only  a  kindly  comprehensive  pity  for  any  man 
who  loved  this  dear  woman  in  vain.  .  .  . 
He  never  even  dreamed  that  she  cared  for  "the 
Bennett  boy." 

A  little  later,  leaning  across  the  table  to  her, 
a  vision  of  the  young  chap's  face  as  he  had 
seen  it  on  the  stairs  recurring  to  him,  he  said : 

"I  wish  I  could  be  of  some  service  to  Ben- 
nett, Virginia." 

And  with  a  singular  smile,  Mrs.  Bathurst 
said :  "Perhaps  some  day — you  may  be." 


290 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

THE  DOCTOR  AND  HIS  BOY 

WHEN  the  first  cold  of  November  had 
stung  and  passed,  when  the  middle  of 
the  month  had  bitten  through  the  country  and 
found  the  heart  of  the  earth,  when  through- 
out the  land  fragrant  torches  had  been  lit  and 
the  air  smelt  of  fire  and  pine,  the  deceptive 
haze  of  an  unexpected  midsummer  day  fell 
over  the  country  like  a  veil  and  there  came  a 
softness  on  the  wintry  air  as  delusive  as  a 
woman's  promises  which  she  never  means  to 
keep.  Doctor  Brainard  sat  in  his  ofBce  ex- 
pediting his  last  patient;  eager  to  get  out  for 
a  certain  drive. 

The  last  patient  had  scarcely  closed  the  front 
door  behind  him,  carrying  away  with  him  his 
complaints  and  his  groans  and  his  prescrip- 
tions, when  the  door  from  the  hallway  opened 
291 


FIRST    LOVE 

into  Doctor  Brainard's  office  and  another  vis- 
itor came  in. 

"My  word,  John,"  said  the  doctor,  with  his 
hands  outstretched,  "I  can't  believe  my  eyes!" 

He  had  not  seen  his  boy  nor  heard  one  line 
from  him  since  the  young  man  left  him  in  the 
summer. 

"You're  an  ungrateful  chap,"  but  the  doctor 
paused  and  followed  up,  "In  Heaven's  name, 
John,  I  believe  you've  come  to  see  me  pro- 
fessionally. Haven't  you,  my  son?" 

He  called  him  that  name  and  looked  at  him 
over  his  glasses.  Many  years  before  the  Ben- 
nett boy  had  stood  where  he  was  standing  now, 
twisting  between  his  hands  his  school  cap,  and 
nervous,  awkward,  and  proud,  he  had  said  that 
rather  than  be  sent  to  school  by  a  woman  he 
would  work  in  a  store. 

Doctor  Brainard  at  that  time  hadn't  thought 

twice   about   the   Bennett   boy;   but   he   had 

learned  to  love  him  dearly  in  the  intervening 

years,  and  he  had  grown  even  dearer  during 

292 


THE   DOCTOR    AND    HIS    BOY 

these  months  when  John  had  left  him  in  utter 
ignorance  of  his  whereabouts,  and  while  the 
doctor  from  a  distance  watched  him  and  fol- 
lowed him  as  well  as  he  could,  yearning,  but 
not  daring  to  make  a  sign. 

Bennett  flung  his  overcoat  and  hat  on  a 
chair;  he  looked  thirty  years  old — his  first 
youth  was  for  ever  gone,  his  face  bore  the 
marks  of  things  which  it  cut  the  doctor  to  the 
heart  to  see  and  recognize. 

"If  I  were  his  own  father  now,"  he  thought. 
"Thank  God,  his  mother  has  been  spared 
this !"  "Sit  down,  my  boy,"  he  said. 

John  didn't  do  so;  instead  he  thrust  his 
hands  in  his  pockets  and  walked  over  to  the 
front  windows  and  looked  out  into  the  bright 
street.  A  trolley-car  ran  between  the  asphalt 
where  the  horse-car  used  to  swing  lazily 
along.  Down  the  wide  street,  in  the  sunlight, 
a  long  line  of  golden  leaves  blew  in  a  whirling 
dance. 

"Don't  let  me  keep  you  from  your  visits," 
293 


FIRST   LOVE 

Bennett  quietly  remarked,  without  so  much  as 
turning  around.  "I  see  the  buggy's  waiting, 
isn't  it?" 

Doctor  Brainard,  who  had  come  up  behind 
him,  put  his  hands  on  his  shoulders. 

"You  come  along  and  drive  with  me;  I've 
only  got  a  couple  of  people  to  see,  and  you  can 
wait  outside.  I  shan't  be  long  anywhere.  After 
that  we'll  drive  out  in  the  country." 

Aside  from  a  word  or  two  about  a  direction 
which  they  would  take,  Doctor  Brainard  did 
not  talk  to  his  prodigal  until  the  last  call  had 
been  made ;  then  the  young  man  drove  him  out 
of  the  town  into  the  country. 

"This  isn't  the  first  time  you've  been  away 
from  Syracuse,  but  it's  the  first  time  you've 
come  back  like  this,"  the  doctor  said.  "But 
you've  come  back,  and  as  far  as  that  goes,  I 
take  it  as  a  good  sign." 

Between  his  teeth  the  young  man  said  rather 
brutally :   "Don't  preach  to  me,"  and  with  un- 
disturbed good-humor  his  friend  answered : 
294 


THE   DOCTOR   AND    HIS    BOY 

"Why,  I  haven't  even  the  right  to  your  con- 
fidences." 

And  the  other  exclaimed :  "Lord,  my  con- 
fidences! I  guess  nobody  would  care  to  hear 
them ;  and  as  far  as  that  goes,  you're  the  only 
person  in  the  world  that  cares  a  hang  whether 
I  live  or  die  or  go  to  hell!  I've  been  a  cur  to 
bother  you,  and  you've  always  been  a  brick, 
Doctor  Brainard.  I  haven't  any  confidences  or 
any  excuses,"  and  his  pale  face  with  its  scars 
spoke  more  eloquently  than  his  words  to  the 
older  man.  "But  I've  been  through  hell,  all 
right,"  John  said,  and  added  more  naturally: 
"It  doesn't  seem  to  have  burned  me  up  quite, 
though  I  wish  it  had !" 

For  a  long  time  he  drove  without  any  fur- 
ther remark;  finally  the  doctor  asked  him  to 
hold  up  while  he  lighted  a  cigar. 

John  did  so  and  lighted  one  as  well,  smoking 
it  as  he  drove  slowly  between  the  bare  yellow 
fields. 

The  golden  light  of  the  afternoon  swept 
295 


FIRST   LOVE 

from  horizon  to  horizon;  the  clustering  trees 
were  still  leafy,  for  the  winds  this  year  had 
been  few,  and  hillocks  and  furrows,  gray  fence 
rails  and  sandy  roads  were  all  painted  and 
bathed  in  the  warm  deceptive  glory.  The  sky, 
pale  and  cloudless,  appeared  to  have  lent  all  its 
light  to  the  earth,  and  spread  ethereal  and  cold 
over  the  warmer  land. 

"When  you  were  up  at  the  farm,"  Doctor 
Brainard  said,  "I  knew  then  just  where  you 
were  and  what  you  were  going  through — but 
a  man  can't  force  a  friend's  confidence."  He 
very  delicately  put  himself  on  a  plane  with  the 
younger  man,  as  though  they  had  been  of  an 
age.  "I  would  have  gladly  helped  you,  but  I 
don't  think  any  one  ever  helps  another  much— 
in  such  things,  at  any  rate.  Certain  states  only 
wear  themselves  out."  And  after  a  few  mo- 
ments, he  added,  "When  they  take  hold  of  a 
big,  fine  fellow  such  as  you  are,  and  drag  him 
down,  then  they're  cursed — otherwise— 

The  young  fellow  driving  began  to  frown, 
296 


THE   DOCTOR    AND    HIS    BOY 

but  the  doctor  had  been  clever  enough  to  stop 
at  a  word  which  John  would  like  to  follow  up, 
and  John  repeated  it  and  asked : 

"Otherwise?" 

"Why,  they're  capable — "  the  doctor  cast  his 
eye  over  the  mellow  country — "they're  capable 
of  going  along  with  him  into  every  season,  of 
filling  his  barns  and  his  storehouses  until  the 
grain's  all  in." 

Bennett  had  never  thought  of  Doctor  Brain- 
ard  as  being  young,  as  being  anything  but  a 
frumpy  old  country  doctor,  and  an  old  trump, 
a  brick ;  as  a  man  of  sentiment,  why,  the  very 
odors  of  anodynes  and  medicines  in  the  gloomy 
old  James  Street  house  put  romance  away. 

They  passed  a  big  red  farm-house  where  the 
barn  door  stood  open  and  the  loft  doors 
were  wide.  Bags  of  grain  were  being  thrown 
up  from  a  heaped  wagon,  and  the  doctor's 
simile,  taken  from  wayside  things,  appealed  to 
his  companion.  Then  he  forgot  everything  but 
his  own  absorbing  contemplations. 
297 


FIRST    LOVE 

"You've  been  in  New  York,"  said  the  doc- 
tor. "I  suppose  you've  been  more  or  less  keep- 
ing yourself  there.  I've  been  sending  your  let- 
ters to  the  Club,  and  that's  where  I  sent  the 
last  check." 

John  said  cruelly :  "I've  been  down  there  all 
this  time,  you're  right.  I  didn't  write  because 
I  didn't  want  to — I  bit  at  everything  I  could 
find,"  he  said  sharply,  "and  I  couldn't  find  any- 
thing to  take  the  taste  away — "  He  now  turned 
his  face  to  his  friend,  and  the  doctor  looked  at 
him  with  a  quick  alarm. 

Doctor  Brainard  put  his  hand  on  his  ward's 
knee.  "I  don't  ask  you  any  impertinent  ques- 
tions; it's"  your  own  life.  I  guess  the  stuff  in 
you  is  good  enough  to  pull  you  out.  I  know 
just  about  how  damn  fool  you've  been,  John, 
but  you  haven't  been  taking  drugs,  have  you?" 

And  the  boy  threw  his  bright  head  back  and 
laughed.   There  was  a  bitterness  and  a  touch- 
ing sadness  in  his  laugh.  "Search  me,"  he  said. 
"By  Jove;  I  wish  I'd  thought  of  them!" 
298 


THE   DOCTOR   AND    HIS   BOY 

In  spite  of  what  his  expression  implied,  the 
older  man  exclaimed  with  gratitude:  "Good, 
good!  You  can  cure  any  healthy  animal  of  a 
sting,  all  right." 

And  John  followed  up:  "Well,  you  know, 
they  take  it  in  their  own  way  and  roll  in  the 
mud." 

And  after  quite  an  interval,  John  spoke 
again  and  said :  "Doctor,  you  seem  to  think 
you  know  a  lot  about  me." 

"I  know  all  the  Valley  knows,"  said  his 
friend.  "I  know  the  common  talk." 

The  young  man  frowned  desperately ;  anger 
and  rebellion,  shame  and  humiliation  had  strug- 
gled with  him  for  a  long  time,  and  he  had 
given  his  confidences  to  no  one. 

"She's  ruined  my  life  at  the  start,"  he  said 
passionately,  "and  I  don't  want  to  pull  it  to- 
gether; I  don't  care  a  damn  what  becomes  of 
me  now.  I  haven't  got  a  cent  in  the  world ;  I've 
tasted  the  lowest  things  of  life  to  forget  her, 
and  don't  you  talk  about  the  gathering  in  of 
299 


FIRST    LOVE 

the  grain  to  me,  or  of  anything  but  a  woman's 
cursed  influence  on  a  man.  There's  never  go- 
ing to  be  any  decent  harvest  for  me,  Doctor 
Brainard;  I've  died  young." 

The  doctor  found  there  was  no  place  for 
humor  or  even  for  philosophy.  Though  the 
man  was  young,  what  difference  did  that 
make?  There  was  great  affection  in  his  voice 
as  he  asked : 

"Why  did  you  come  back  here,  John  ?" 

The  other  threw  his  cigar  out,  spoke  to  the 
horse,  and  said :  "I  don't  know ;  habit,  I  guess, 
much  as  anything.  I  suppose  underlying  it  all 
there's  some  magnet  in  it,  some  humiliating 
idea  that  I  may  catch  sight  of  her  again." 

"Let's  turn,"  said  the  doctor;  ''it  gets  sud- 
denly cold  these  evenings,  and  I've  got  another 
patient  or  two  coming  to  see  me  before  sun- 
down." 

They  turned ;  John  spoke  to  the  horse,  and 
as  they  rolled  softly  on  their  rubber  tires  down 
the  street  they  passed  the  Bathurst  house.  John 
300 


THE   DOCTOR   AND    HIS   BOY 

didn't  look  toward  it ;  he  set  his  face  as  though 
it  were  an  iron  mask  and  never  turned  to  right 
or  left. 

Bennett,  when  they  got  back  to  the  house, 
went  to  bed  in  his  old  room  and  heard  the 
trolley  run  till  dawn  along  the  familiar  street. 
The  following  morning  he  opened  the  Syracuse 
Times  in  bed.  It  was  noon;  he  had  slept  long 
and  no  one  had  disturbed  him;  the  maid 
brought  him  his  coffee  and  the  papers  when  he 
at  length  rang  his  bell. 

The  Times  fell  from  his  hands.  He  sat  there 
motionless,  staring  white  and  red,  white  and 
red,  then  he  read  the  paragraph  again. 

Toward  two  o'clock  Doctor  Brainard  came 
at  length  out  of  his  cage,  as  John  used  to  call 
it,  and  found  his  visitor  marching  up  and  down 
like  a  wild  man,  waiting  for  him ;  and  Bennett 
took  the  doctor's  arm. 

"Did  you  read,  did  you  see  it  in  the  Times, 
did  you  know?" 

The  doctor  nodded.  "Mr.  Bathurst's  been 
301 


FIRST   LOVE 

ill  for  two  months;  I  was  called  in  consulta- 
tion there  before  you  came." 

"Why  in  thunder  didn't  you  tell  me  so  yes- 
terday?" 

The  doctor  made  no  reply. 

Bennett,  without  noticing  it,  said :  "Don't 
you  see,  don't  you  understand — she's  free, 
she's  free!" 

"Have  you  had  your  coffee  yet  ?"  asked  the 
doctor. 

The  young  man  resumed  his  walk  up  and 
down  the  drawing-room  at  large.  When  could 
he  go  to  her — when  could  he  see  her?  She 
was  here,  then,  in  Syracuse;  he  hadn't  really 
known  it,  but  he  had  heard  she  had  gone 
abroad.  He  had  tried  not  to  hear,  not  to  know, 
to  be  ignorant,  to  blot  her  out  of  existence  for 
himself.  He  flung  out  his  hands  with  a  vio- 
lent gesture  and  exclaimed:  "And  I  haven't 
got  a  cent  in  the  world !" 

Doctor  Brainard  stood  sturdily  before  the 
mantel.  He  looked  practical  and  commonplace 
302 


THE   DOCTOR   AND    HIS   BOY 

and  businesslike,  a  little  dried  up,  far  from  be- 
ing a  lover;  he  gazed  thoughtfully  at  the  young 
fellow  launched  so  far  on  his  sea  of  trouble, 
launched  so  far  on  that  wonderful  sea  whose 
waters,  because  of  death  and  fate,  had  been 
calmed  for  him  many  years.  He  didn't  know 
whether  he  envied  John  or  not,  but  he  loved 
him. 

"The  woman's  almost  old  enough  to  be  his 
mother,"  he  said  to  himself.  "She's  a  brilliant, 
worldly  creature ;  she's  had  a  lot  of  admiration, 
and  she'll  have  a  lot  more  now.  Why,  there 
isn't  the  ghost  of  a  chance  for  him.  Still, 
women  have  been  fools — fools  before." 

Doctor  Brainard  looked  at  the  lover,  this 
wreck  of  boyhood — its  very  destruction  would 
touch  her  and  she  would  know  what  he  had 
been  through  for  her.  "Confound  her,"  he  said 
to  himself,  "but  I'm  going  to  risk  it." 

"Will  you  be  quiet  a  second  and  stop  walk- 
ing up  and  down?  I  told  you  that  when  you 
found  a  good  girl  who  would  marry  you  I'd 
303 


FIRST    LOVE 

buy  the  ranch  back  and  all  that  would  start 
you  fresh.  Mrs.  Bathurst,  as  a  widow,  is  not  in 
the  conditions — still,  that's  your  affair  and 
hers.  If  you  want  to  ask  her  to  marry  you, 
you  can  tell  her  that  you  own  the  ranch,  and 
that  you  will  be  my  heir.  She's  rich  and  prob- 
ably won't  care,  but  you're  not  a  beggar." 

John  stared  at  him,  and  at  the  human  kind- 
ness, at  the  benign  sympathy,  his  own  natural 
expression  came  back  to  his  face.  He  grasped 
his  friend's  hand. 

"You're  a  wonder,  Doctor  Brainard,  a  won- 
der." 

When  could  he  go,  when  would  it  be  decent 
to  go  ?  Not  for  weeks,  not  for  months.  Where 
would  she  be  then ;  would  she  leave  ?  Well,  he 
would  follow  her. 

"Have  you  had  your  coffee,  John  ?" 

"Yes— yes." 

"Well,  let  up  now  on  this  asylum  walk  of 
yours  and  come  with  me  to  the  dining-room 
and  have  some  more." 

304 


THE    DOCTOR    AND    HIS    BOY 

The  real  greatness  of  his  really  great  love 
carried  him  through  the  next  few  days  so  far 
apart  from  the  common  herd  that  Doctor 
Brainard  wondered,  was  much  impressed  by 
him,  and  as  he  watched  John,  he  was  transfig- 
ured back  into  his  own  youth  and  to  his  own 
misery,  and  John  grew  dearer  to  him  every 
day. 

The  real  greatness  of  his  love  went  with  him 
to  the  funeral  of  the  Honorable  Peter  Bath- 
urst.  Up  in  the  gallery  of  the  church,  out  of 
sight  and  unobserved,  the  light  from  the  win- 
dow back  of  him  shining  on  his  bare,  glisten- 
ing head,  he  stared  down  on  the  crowd,  on  the 
solemn  procession,  on  the  altar,  on  the  coffin 
and  on  her.  She  was  so  still,  so  beautiful  in 
her  heavy  weeds ;  her  face  was  pale  and  quiet, 
and  it  made  him  ashamed  even  to  think  of  love 
then,  for  she  seemed  a  thing  sacred  by  reason 
of  her  black  garments  and  the  solemn  words 
that  were  being  said. 

But  his  love  was  stronger  than  any  form 
305 


FIRST   LOVE 

and  his  love  was  real ;  whereas,  he  knew  there 
could  be  no  great  sorrow  in  her  heart,  and  it 
carried  him  over  the  hymns  and  the  chants, 
and  his  human  love  spoke  above  the  things  in 
the  prayer-book  and  over  the  few  tears  that 
were  shed.  He  saw  her  stepsons  and  Mrs.  Peter 
and  Miss  Cynthia  Forsythe,  Jack's  fiancee, 
and  he  saw  the  little  child,  too,  carried  in, 
standing  straight  up  in  the  pew,  staring  about ; 
and  as  he  looked  on  him,  the  words  of  the 
child's  nursery  rhyme  came  back  quaintly  to 
his  mind : 

"All  the  King's  horses  and  all  the  King's  men 
Can  never,  never — " 

and  the  old  form  and  state  had  been  utterly 
changed  by  death.  These  pictures  passed  be- 
fore his  excited  eyes,  and  he  then  saw  nothing 
more  throughout  but  Virginia.  And  ardent, 
adoring,  tender,  he  leaned  over  the  gallery  rail, 
gazing  on  the  melancholy  crowd  as  though  a 
306 


THE   DOCTOR   AND    HIS    BOY 

bright  angel,   winged  with  life  and  ecstasy, 
folded  its  pinions  above  death. 

At  the  door  Virginia  went  out  between  her 
stepsons,  and  Nicholas  Pyrnne  walked  near 
her.  But  John's  great  love  carried  him  even 
beyond  this  fact. 

Doctor  Brainard  saw  that  he  had  no  need  to 
tell  his  ward  to  give  himself  time  and  to  give 
her  time.  A  fortnight  passed  and  John  never 
stirred  from  the  house ;  he  hardly  slept  or  ate, 
but  he  didn't  drink.  The  doctor  did  not  know 
how  many  hours  were  spent  in  remorseful  re- 
gret for  the  short  roll  in  the  mud,  and  that  in 
the  face  of  the  vision  he  had  had  of  Virginia 
Bathurst  in  the  church,  in  the  face  of  his  hopes 
and  his  plans,  his  indulgences  were  a  crime 'to 
him  beyond  forgiveness. 

In  a  few  days  John's  limit  had  been  reached. 
The  conventional  wait  of  months  was  not  to 
be  expected  of  this  lover.  The  family  in  gen- 
eral had  gone  to  Tallahoe  directly  after  the 
307 


FIRST    LOVE 

funeral,  but  the  affairs  of  the  estate  called  for 
Mrs.  Bathurst's  presence,  and  both  the  doctor 
and  his  ward  knew  that  she  had  returned  to 
town. 

Before  starting  on  his  rounds  one  afternoon 
the  doctor  saw  John  come  out  of  the  house, 
stand  for  a  moment  on  the  step,  looking  up  the 
street  in  a  certain  direction.  He  appeared 
taller,  maturer,  his  face  white  and  grave;  he 
had  the  air  of  departure,  the  air  of  a  man 
starting  on  a  long  journey.  Doctor  Brainard 
turned  away  as  nervous  and  excited  as  though 
he  were  himself  about  to  ask  a  woman  to  marry 
him. 

On  his  own  account,  he  was  caring  for  a 
very  important  case  and  it  kept  him  late,  past 
his  dinner-hour.  When  he  returned,  learning 
that  his  guest  was  in  the  house,  he  went  up  to 
the  young  man's  room.  He  knocked,  got  no 
answer,  and  went  in.  An  electric  light  from 
the  street  porch  showed  him  the  figure  sitting 
in  the  window.  At  the  doctor's  entrance  John 
308 


THE   DOCTOR   AND   HIS   BOY 

rose  and  was  the  first  to  speak,  in  a  voice  all 
roughened  at  the  edges,  a  voice  almost  like  a 
boy's,  so  naive  it  was  in  grief. 

''Do  you  think  I  could  get  away  anywhere  ?" 

"To  be  sure.  Want  to  go — abroad  ?" 

"Yes." 

Brainard  mentally  calculated. 

"This  is  Monday — how  would  Saturday's 
boat  do?" 

"There's  Wednesday's  boat,"  John  sug- 
gested. 

"All  right,  my  boy." 

In  the  extremely  vague  light  Doctor  Brain- 
ard saw  the  blond  head  bend  a  little.  Not  a 
word  of  consolation  came  to  his  mind;  he 
didn't  try  for  any,  knowing  that  in  the  war  be- 
tween words  and  feelings,  words  went  to  the 
wall. 

"I'll  go  to  the  bank  the  first  thing  in  the 
morning  and  fix  you  up  a  letter  of  credit."  He 
waited  a  second,  then  said:  "I'll  fix  it  up  for 
a  year's  expenses." 

309 


FIRST   LOVE 

The  young  man  heard  this  through  his  mis- 
ery. "I'll  make  it  all  right,  Doctor,  some  day, 
if  i_if  i_'» 

"Come,"  said  the  Doctor,  "come,  John,  buck 
up,  my  boy." 

John  returned  to  his  place  by  the  window 
and  sat  down  again,  thinking,  his  head  on  his 
arms. 

"I'll  go  and  tell  Nelly  to  pack  your  things 
and  your  trunk." 

The  doctor  stood  there  a  moment  in  the 
half  darkness,  looking  with  compassion  on  the 
figure  of  the  son  of  the  woman  he  loved,  and 
his  own  grief  came  back  again.  He  mentally 
called  up  with  distinctness  the  figure  of  Mary 
Poole  as  he  turned  away  and  went  out,  shut- 
ting the  door  behind  him.  And  to  the  Bennett 
boy,  as  he  sat  there,  sorrowing  more  pitifully 
than  he  had  ever  sorrowed  over  the  loss  of  his 
home  and  his  personal  things,  there  came  the 
figure  of  a  woman  now  to  stand  behind  him 
and  to  lay  her  shadowy  fingers  on  his  hair — it 
310 


THE   DOCTOR   AND   HIS   BOY 

wasn't  the  same  woman's  fingers  that  had  come 
in  on  his  childish  misery  in  the  hall-room — it 
was  a  different  woman  that  in  the  precarious 
light  developed,  and  John  Bennett,  unconscious 
of  her  ghostly  presence,  leaned  against  her 
shadow  as  one  whom  his  mother  comforted. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

A  RARE  THING 

THE  following  autumn,  Doctor  Brainard, 
dozing  on  the  porch  under  the  honey- 
suckle vines  at  Home  Farm,  awakened  with 
a  consciousness  that  his  delicious  nap  had 
been  spoiled.  A  clear  voice  came  from  the 
roadway  to  his  hired  man:  "Do  you  know 
whether  Mr.  Bennett  has  come  yet?  But  I 
thought  he  was  to  arrive  to-day  ?" 

The  doctor  stirred  his  drowsy  limbs,  got 
up  and  went  toward  the  stable.  The  visit 
thereafter  was  always  connected  in  his  mind 
with  the  smell  of  honeysuckle  and  with  the 
stirring  of  the  southwest  wind  in  the  brilliant 
maple  leaves. 

"Oh,  How  d'do,  Doctor  Brainard?" 
A  smart  dog-cart  had  drawn  up  by  the  stable 
door;  there  was  an  English  groom  in  the  back 
312 


A   RARE   THING 

and  two  ladies  in  front.  Doctor  Brainard 
recognized  the  trap  as  belonging  to  Mrs. 
Nicholas  Pyrnne,  whom  he  greeted  cordially, 
but  the  young  lady  was  a  stranger,  a  much 
younger  woman  than  the  owner  of  the  dog- 
cart. Dark  and  graceful  she  sat  up  well  beside 
Mrs.  Nicholas  Pyrnne.  She  closed  her  parasol 
and  held  it,  leaning  on  it  with  her  white-gloved 
hands,  and  looked  pleasantly  at  the  old  gentle- 
man from  eyes  blue  as  Irish  lakes. 

"This  is  Doctor  Brainard  ?"  She  seemed  to 
know  him.  "I've  heard  a  lot  about  you  from  a 
mutual  friend."  She  gave  him  her  hand  with 
an  attractive  smile.  "We  thought — I  thought 
that  Mr.  Bennett  would  be  here  by  this  time. 
When  he  left  us  yesterday  at  the  steamer  he 
said  he  was  coming  directly  to  you,  so  I've 
driven  over  to  ask  him  if  he  won't  ride  to- 
morrow." 

She  monopolized  the  conversation  in  her 
clear,  bright  voice.  There  was  no  pronoun  in 
it  but  the  first  person  singular.  Her  com- 
313 


FIRST    LOVE 

panion,  completely  out  of  the  moment's 
interest,  fixed  her  eyes  on  the  level  sweep  of 
the  autumn  fields. 

When  Mrs.  Pyrnne  had  introduced  Miss 
Haven  to  the  doctor,  he  exclaimed:  "Oh, 
of  course,"  and  remembered  that  "he  knew 
the  name  from  John's  letters  very  well 
indeed!" 

"We  are  going  to  be  neighbors,  Doctor 
Brainard,"  Miss  Haven  informed  him,  "for 
my  father  has  taken  the  Point  Setter  Place  for 
a  year." 

"Ah,  yes,  that  will  be  perfectly  delightful; 
it's  a  fine  old  property.  John  will  be  home 
to-night." 

After  Mrs.  Pyrnne  had  exchanged  a  few 
words  with  her  old  acquaintance  and  said 
how  very  sorry  she  was  not  to  see  John  Bennett 
— she  was  going  to  Newport  that  night — 
the  younger  lady  leaned  out  of  the  dog-cart, 
interested  in  the  low  house  with  its  vines, 
where,  through  one  open  window,  she  could  see 


A   RARE   THING 

the  piano,  and  she  looked  past  the  house  and 
the  garden  and  over  the  slope. 

"Is  that  the  spring-house,  Doctor  Brainard  ?" 
she  asked.  "And  is  that  the  brook  down 
there?" 

"Bless  my  soul,  yes — you  know  Home 
Farm?" 

She  seemed  to  know  it  intimately  to  judge 
by  the  expression,  which  almost  said  to  him: 
"Dear  me,  how  stupid  you  are;  don't  you 
know  it  has  become  to  me  a  sort  of  sentimental 
playground  already?" 

Doctor  Brainard  said  to  himself :  "My  word, 
I  bet  they're  engaged!" 

When  the  smart  trap  with  the  two  smart 
ladies  had  finally  driven  away,  he  walked  down 
to  the  gate  waiting  for  John,  and  presently  he 
opened  it  to  let  the  buggy  pass  through  when 
it  went  to  the  station  to  fetch  the  home- 
comer. 

Then  Brainard  clicked  the  gate  to  and  leaned 
there,  looking  toward  the  town,  where  not 
315 


FIRST   LOVE 

more  than  three  miles  away  the  Point  Setter 
Place  had  been  let  to  the  Havens. 

"They're  not  unlike,"  he  mused,  "those  two 
women;  the  same  build,  the  same  type,  and 
I've  always  thought  that  a  man  always  loves 
a  certain  type  of  woman.  I  guess  I  didn't 
do  far  wrong  when  I  bought  back  the  ranch 
from  Furniss." 

Delighted,  humorous  over  the  situation,  he 
affirmed  at  the  end  of  his  little  meditation, 
nodding  briskly:  "I  guess  that's  the  girl." 

After  supper  that  night,  when  the  returned 
traveler  had  lighted  his  English  brienvood 
pipe,  discoursed  on  its  merits,  polished  it 
up  with  the  palm  of  his  hand,  forced  the 
doctor  to  weigh  it  and  smell  it  and  admire  it, 
it  was  not  until  they  both  sat  in  the  doorway, 
smoking  under  the  honeysuckle  vine  that 
Doctor  Brainard  said: 

"Miss  Haven  rode  over  from  the  Point 
Setter  Place  to  ask  for  you.  It  seems  they've 
rented  that  property." 

3*6 


A   RARE   THING 

The  adopted  son  took  his  pipe  out  of 
his  mouth,  smiled  at  it  rapturously,  and 
said: 

"Gosh,  isn't  she  a  beauty !" 

"She  is  a  very  handsome  woman,  indeed." 

"I  meant  the  pipe."  John  rubbed  it  on  his 
sleeve  until  it  shone. 

"She  seems  to  have  a  lot  of  spirit  and 
charm,  too,"  the  doctor  continued. 

Then  his  companion  asked:  "Did  she  drive 
over  here  alone?" 

"A  groom  came  with  her,"  replied  Doctor 
Brainard,  and  before  he  could  pursue  any 
further  hypocrisy,  the  young  man  remarked : 

"It's  a  very  rare  thing,  isn't  it,  Doctor,  that 
a  man  marries  his  first  love?" 

And  the  doctor  agreed  that  it  was  very  rare 
indeed,  thinking  to  himself :  "By  George, 
the  boy's  going  back  to  his  old  theme!" 

"Milly  Haven,"  said  John  meditatively, 
"was  my  first  love." 

317 


CHAPTER  XXV 

THE  SPELL  BROKEN 

SIX  years  later  he  returned  to  Syracuse  and 
in  the  springtide. 

Doctor  Brainard  had  died  suddenly  and 
among  the  bits  of  property  left  to  him  along- 
side of  the  doctor's  fortune,  John  Bennett 
came  into  possession  of  the  old  James  Street 
house,  his  old  home. 

He  stood,  toward  four  o'clock  one  after- 
noon, in  the  window  of  the  empty  dwelling. 
There  were  no  household  goods  belonging  to 
other  people  to  disturb  him  with  strange  mem- 
ories or  to  suggest  anything  but  his  own 
people.  He  could  see  the  lawns,  green  with  the 
young  growth  of  spring;  the  grass  sown  with 
gay  dandelion  heads.  The  brick  path  to  the 
gate  sagged,  was  broken  up,  weeds  grew  over 
it;  but  even  in  disuse  and  the  ravages  of 
318 


THE    SPELL   BROKEN 

time,  the  atmosphere  of  familiar  things  came 
back  and  met  him  here  at  home. 

Standing  in  the  bare  window  in  the  bare 
room,  far  away  now  from  any  other  house- 
hold and  from  any  other  treasures,  John  let 
himself  think  back.  It  was  the  very  first  time 
that  he  had  given  himself  any  such  mental 
holiday. 

It  was  as  plain  to  him  as  yesterday  how  he 
had  stood  in  that  very  window  on  the  day  of 
the  auction  and  longed  and  yearned  for  the 
one  possession  that  meant  his  father  to  him; 
how  he  had  suffered  there,  a  wretched,  lonely, 
little  boy,  and  how  some  one  had  come  and 
helped  him  through! 

He  was  past  thirty  now,  a  young  man  still, 
but  he  had  matured  and  deepened  as  the  years 
sounded  new  depths  in  his  loving,  rich  nature, 
and  as  home  life,  husband-hood  and  father- 
hood opened  the  springs  of  his  heart. 

But  this  return  to  old  things  and  old  places 
leveled  like  magic  the  distance  between  the 
319 


FIRST   LOVE 

little  boy  and  the  man,  and,  like  his  child  self 
on  the  auction  day,  John  felt  and  acknowl- 
edged that  there  was  always  in  his  heart  a 
yearning  and  a  loneliness,  and  that  indefinable 
something  which  nothing  had  ever  quite  an- 
swered. 

As  he  so  stood,  reflecting,  turning  his  mental 
and  spiritual  state  over  in  his  mind,  he  was 
waiting  for  the  builder  with  whom  he  had  a 
rendezvous,  who  was  to  come  and  make  plans 
for  the  new  town  house  which  he  intended 
putting  up  here  in  Syracuse,  where  he  should 
some  day  come  and  live. 

The  solitude  of  the  rooms  oppressed  him  like 
an  audible  demand  on  him;  they  stretched 
away,  empty,  untenanted.  He  was  going  to 
change  them  all,  the  people  whom  he  would 
bring  here  to  live  had  never  known  his  boy- 
hood's memories  or  any  of  his  old  life,  and  he 
didn't  care  that  they  should.  He  had  been 
desolate  here  and  he  was  desolate  now,  as  he 
gazed  out  on  the  sunny  lawn,  at  the  road, 
320 


THE    SPELL   BROKEN 

and  at  the  spring  sunlight  filling  the  town 
streets. 

It  was  the  inevitable  isolation  of  soul,  the 
solitude  of  being,  the  yearning  of  a  man  young, 
full  of  desire,  very  ardent  and  keen,  for  the 
ideal — for  the  completion  of  an  idea  he  had 
never  been  entirely  able  to  firing  to  its  proper 
satisfaction. 

As  he  bravely  allowed  himself  to  understand 
this  fact,  a  pang  hurt  him  like  a  physical  thing, 
his  heart  swelled  within  him.  The  associations 
around  him  had  taken  him  back  nearly  twenty 
years,  and  the  childhood  agony  that  had  shaken 
him  here  was  no  more  real  than  that  which 
swayed  him  now,  and  he  wanted — wanted — to 
see  her  again.  He  permitted  himself  to  confess 
the  fact  and  that  anger,  revolt,  blame,  and 
reproach  had  long  ago  died,  in  his  memories 
of  her — he  forgot  that  he  had  ever  thought 
her  a  cruel,  heartless  coquette  who  had  played 
with  a  man's  heart  and  soul,  he  forgot  every- 
thing excepting  that  she  had  been  to  him  the 
321 


FIRST   LOVE 

one  perfect  woman  and  that  he  wanted  to  see 
her  once  more. 

In  these  years,  happy  years,  calm,  success- 
ful, and  harmonious,  nothing  had  disturbed 
his  content.  The  new  love  which  he  had 
violently  and  desperately  taken  into  his  life 
crushed  out  the  old.  But  here,  in  his  native 
town,  her  memory  came  to  tell  him  that  he 
could  never  be  happy  or  at  peace  unless  he 
saw  her.  And  that  should  he  see  her  and 
love  her  again,  and  find  that  he  had  never 
ceased  to  do  so,  his  happiness  was  doomed. 
Nothing  but  her  hands  could  close  the  doors 
between  them — or  open  on  the  gardens  of  his 
old  self  and  his  first  great  passion  a  promise 
of  something  from  her  still — the  fulfilment  to 
him  of  the  promises  she  had  never  kept. 

A  motor,  driven  by  a  man  in  livery,  puffed 
up,  stopped  at  his  gate,  and  a  lady  got  out  of 
the  car  and  came  up  the  sagging  brick  path 
where  the  weeds  had  grown.  He  knew  that 
it  was  Mrs.  Nicholas  Pyrnne — his  heart  beat 
322 


THE    SPELL    BROKEN 

like  an  engine  in  his  breast  and  he  did  not 
move,  but  waited  as  he  was  until  she  came  up 
the  steps  and  her  foot  fell  on  the  porch.  He 
had  not  seen  her  since,  in  the  drawing-room  of 
her  own  house  here  in  Syracuse,  he  had  asked 
her  to  marry  him  and  she  had  told  him  she 
was  engaged  to  Nicholas  Pyrnne.  She  came 
in  without  ringing  or  knocking,  for  the  door 
stood  wide  open,  and  before  he  could  decide 
whether  to  run  or  stand  fast,  he  knew  without 
seeing  her  that  she  had  come  into  the  room 
and  was  standing  before  him.  He  never  re- 
membered whether  or  not  he  greeted  her;  he 
had  a  vague  feeling  that  as  she  came  their 
hearts  and  senses  and  minds  blent  in  a  mystical, 
union. 

"I  saw  you  at  poor  Doctor  Brainard's 
funeral  last  week,  John.  I  was  hoping  we 
would  meet  before  you  went  West !  .  .  .  It's 
awfully  nice  to  see  you  again,  John;  I've 
had  your  news  from  the  boys.  And  how 
dear  of  you  to  telephone  me,  as  you  did  just 
323 


FIRST   LOVE 

now  from  the  old  house,  and  how  splendid 
that  you're  going  to  live  here  in  Syracuse  some 
day." 

He  had  not  looked  at  her,  with  every  word 
she  said,  his  heart,  like  a  thing  to  be  tor- 
tured and  sacrificed,  was  being  led  back  into 
the  foolish,  dreadful,  wonderful,  beautiful,  and 
agonizing  past.  He  thought  doggedly: 

"There's  nothing  in  her  voice  that's  going 
to  break  the  spell — there's  no  hope  or  help 
there." 

He  had  been  a  fool  to  send  for  her! 

Mrs.  Pyrnne  laughed  softly,  and  that  sound 
was  another  pang,  musical,  humorous,  and 
sweet. 

"Are  you  blind,  John  ?  Have  you  lost  your 
eyesight  ?" 

For  six  years  he  had  been  reading  the  book 
of  young  beauty,  and  he  had  learned  his  lesson 
with  great  affection  and  sincere  love.  He  had 
become  a  connoisseur  of  bloom,  of  soft  youth- 
ful lines,  slenderness  and  grace,  of  eyes  fresh 
324 


THE    SPELL    BROKEN 

and  blue  as  Irish  lakes,  of  raven  hair,  glossy, 
untouched  by  a  white  thread. 

He  put  his  hand  out  frankly  and  said  with- 
out any  perceptible  effort:  "It  was  awfully 
good  of  you  to  come  like  this,  Mrs.  Pyrnne 
— but  you  were  always  good  to  me." 

"I've  been  far  better  to  you  than  you  ever 
knew,"  she  couldn't  help  saying;  she  didn't 
tell  him  that  she  knew  he  found  her  changed. 
But  his  frankness,  his  sudden  ease,  his  look  of 
evident  emancipation!  Oh,  heavens!  Vir- 
ginia Bathurst  had  thought  she  knew  what 
the  keen  pang  was;  she  had  thought  when  he 
left  her  that  day  in  Syracuse,  six  years  ago, 
that  she  could  never  suffer  again.  She  saw 
now  that  she  had  been  wrong. 

"You're  going  to  make  a  lot  of  changes  here, 
aren't  you?  You're  going  to  rebuild?" 

The  proprietor  looked  around  the  bare  rooms 
with  sudden  interest. 

"Yes,  it's  a  little  too  small  for  the  family 
as  it  is  now,  you  know." 
325 


FIRST   LOVE 

She  nodded  sympathetically. 

"See,"  he  indicated  through  the  window, 
"there  comes  the  architect,  confound  him,  and 
who's  that  with  him?" 

"My  husband." 

They  faced  each  other  in  the  dismantled 
room.  Then  John  Bennett,  mentally  and 
spiritually  set  free  by  the  sight  of  her,  yet 
finding  her  wonderfully  dear  and  knowing  that 
he  should  always  love  her  much,  said  warmly : 

"I've  never  dreamed  what  a  splendid  friend 
you  are  until  now.  Do  you  know,  I've  cursed 
you  all  my  life  for  making  me  suffer,  but  I 
understand  that  you  meant  something  else  by 
what  you  did,  and  though,"  he  added  with 
tenderness,  "I  couldn't  imagine  a  greater 
happiness  than  to  have  been  your  husband, 
still  I  know  that  when  you  were  cruel  to  me 
you  did  not  really  mean  to  make  me  grieve." 

The  lady  before  him  rested  her  dark  eyes, 
grave  and  beautiful,  on  John;  her  smile  was 
adorable,  she  was  lovely  as  the  late  rose  is 
326 


THE   SPELL   BROKEN 

lovely  as  it  lays  its  full-blown  beauty  against 
a  patch  of  autumn  sunlight  on  the  wall  before 
it  withers  and  its  petals  fall.  She  put  her 
hand  on  his  shoulder  and  it  reposed  there 
like  snow  on  the  dark  cloth. 

"Your  wife  owes  me  a  great  deal,"  Mrs. 
Pyrnne  said,  "although  I  don't  suppose  she 
knows  it,  for  you  were  a  very  determined 
lover,  John." 

His  heart  began  to  beat  again. 

"You  taught  me  how  to  love,"  he  said. 

Still  thinking  how  charming  and  wonderful 
she  had  been,  how  more  charming  and  more 
wonderful  she  was  now,  putting  as  she  did  her 
master  touch  to  it  all  by  setting  him  free,  by 
leaving  his  mind  and  imagination  free  to  love 
his  wife,  whom  until  this  moment  he  had 
never  really  been  free  to  love  with  all  his 
power — for  he  had  been  haunted,  tempted, 
assailed  with  his  image  of  Virginia  Bathurst — 
still  thinking  that  he  was  grateful  to  her,  he 
said: 

327 


FIRST    LOVE 

"I  have  been  mad  enough  to  think  more  than 
once  of  that  last  night  in  Bathurst  House  and 
what  you  promised  me  then."  He  flushed 
as  he  spoke.  "Of  course,  you  don't  remember, 
but  you  said — " 

She  interrupted  him.  "I  said  I  would  give 
you  all." 

He  nodded.     "I  built  my  life  on  that." 

A  shadow  crossed  her  face  and  she  answered 
hesitatingly:  "I  can't  see  why  you  should  re- 
call this  now." 

And  he  replied,  having  grown  in  his  emanci- 
pation suddenly  very  wise  and  very  clever: 

"I  see  to-day  for  the  first  time  that  when 
you  said  that,  you  meant  something  else.  You 
meant  then  that  you  would  give  me  just  what 
I  have  to-day.  I  mean  to  say — Milly  and  the 
kids." 

The  lady  forced  herself  to  smile. 

"You're  a  very  clever  man,  John." 

And  he  exclaimed,  delighted  at  his  wisdom : 
328 


THE    SPELL   BROKEN 

"Well,  I've  just  thought  it  all  out  now;  and 
you  were  a  wonder,  a  wonder." 

She  laughed  gently.  "So  were  you,  John, 
so  were  you." 

The  light  poured  full  from  the  window  on 
her  now,  revealing  her  plainly.  She  knew  per- 
fectly well,  as  every  beautiful  woman  knows 
well,  that  her  hair  was  marked  with  gray  and 
that  her  bloom  was  faded.  She  stood  fear- 
lessly in  the  garish,  pitiless  light.  It  had 
shone  on  her  twenty  years  ago  as  she  stood 
there  in  the  fresh  bloom  of  her  beauty  and  it 
shone  on  her  now.  Her  hand  was  still  on  his 
shoulder,  and  John  covered  it  with  both  of  his. 
Something  in  her  laugh  brought  back  for  a 
moment  his  old  despair. 

"Oh,"  he  said  with  a  long  breath,  "do  you 
know  that  I  went  through  hell  for  you?  If 
you  had  cared  for  me  even  a  little  bit,  no 
matter  what  •  you  thought  you  ought  to  have 
done,  you  couldn't  have  treated  me  as  you  did. 

329 


FIRST    LOVE 

It  must  have  helped  you  splendidly  not  to 
care." 

She  said:  "Well,  you  don't  seem  to  have 
quite  forgiven  me,  John."  And  to  herself: 
"I  didn't  suppose  I  would  have  to  go  through 
just  this  again.  .  .  ." 

And  he  replied  slowly:  "Oh,  yes,  I  have 
forgiven;  but  it's  a  very  fresh  forgiveness. 
I've  only  just  forgiven  you  this  day." 

In  spite  of  herself,  she  breathed :  "And  you 
speak  of  cruelty !" 

But  she  smiled  as  she  said  the  words,  and 
half  humorously,  half  tenderly,  hearing  the 
steps  of  the  two  men  on  the  porch,  John  said : 

"Do  you  know  that  you  owe  me  many, 
many — " 

And  he  didn't  finish,  for  Mrs.  Pyrnne  bent 
toward  him.  She  blushed,  she  didn't  kiss  him, 
but  for  a  second  her  fragrant  cheek  lay  against 
his  lips,  as  the  full  blown  rose  lays  its  beauty 
to  the  sun — and  then,  as  they  stood  apart, 
Nicholas  Pyrnne  and  the  architect  came  in 
330 


THE    SPELL    BROKEN 

together.  And  in  the  next  five  seconds,  after 
he  had  greeted  the  two  gentlemen,  John  Ben- 
nett, with  a  great  show  of  interest,  was  indi- 
cating to  Mr.  Pyrnne  and  the  builder  where  he 
wanted  the  front  window  to  be  cut  out  and 
transformed  into  a  bow. 


THE   END 


A     000127511     4 


